Showcase Presents – Page 9

July 5, 2011July 10, 2011

Showcase Presents Green Lantern volume 5

By Denny O’Neil, Neal Adams, Dick Giordano, Mike Grell & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-0-85768-224-6

Returning to the usual phonebook-sized black and white tome, this fifth collection starring the Emerald Gladiator of Earth-1 (re-presenting the contents of Green Lantern/Green Arrow #76-89 – barring the all-reprint #88 – and the emerald back-up strips from Flash #217-221, 223-224, 226-228, 230-231, 237-238, 240-243, 245-246) generated groundbreaking, landmark tales from Denny O’Neil & Neal Adams that totally revolutionised the industry, whilst registering such poor sales that the series was cancelled and the heroes unceremoniously shipped into the back of another comicbook. Gradually the emphasis shifted back to crime, adventure and space opera and Green Lantern grew popular enough for his own solo title once moreâ€¦.

By the end of the 1960s America was a bubbling cauldron of social turmoil and experimentation. Everything was challenged and with issue #76 (April 1970 and the first issue of the new decade) Denny O’Neil and comics iconoclast Neal Adams utterly redefined superhero strips with their relevancy-driven stories; transforming complacent establishment masked boy-scouts into uncertain, questioning champions and strident explorers of the revolution.

‘No Evil Shall Escape My Sight!’ (inked by Frank Giacoia) is a landmark in the medium, utterly re-positioning the very concept of the costumed crusader as newly-minted ardent liberal Green Arrow challenged GL’s cosy worldview when the lofty space-cop painfully discovered real villains wore business suits, had expense accounts, hurt people just because of skin colour and would happily poison their own nests for short-term gainâ€¦

Of course, the fact that the story is a brilliant crime-thriller with science-fiction overtones magnificently illustrated doesn’t hurt eitherâ€¦

O’ Neil became sole scripter with this story and, in tight collaboration with ultra-realistic art-genius Adams, instantly overturned contemporary costumed dramas with their societally-targeted relevancy-driven protest-stories. The book became Green Lantern/Green Arrow with Emerald Archer Oliver Queen constantly mouthing off as a radical, liberal sounding-board and platform for a generation-in-crisis whilst staid, quasi-reactionary GL Hal Jordan played the part of the oblivious but well-meaning old guard.

At least the Ring-Slinger was aware of his faults and more or less willing to listen to new ideasâ€¦

At the time this compendium of stories first appeared DC was a company in transition – as indeed was America itself – with new ideas (which, in comic-book terms meant â€œyoung writersâ€) being given much leeway: a veritable wave of fresh, raw talent akin to the very start of the industry, when excitable young creators ran wild with imaginationâ€¦ Their cause wasn’t hurt by an industry in rapid commercial decline: costs were up and the kids just weren’t buying funnybooks in the volumes they used toâ€¦

‘Journey to Desolation’ in #77 was every bit as groundbreaking.

At the conclusion of the last issue an immortal Guardian of the Universe – hereafter known as â€œthe Old Timerâ€ was assigned to accompany the Emerald Duo on a voyage to â€œdiscover Americaâ€: a soul-searching social exploration into the dichotomies which divided the nation. First stop brought the trio to a poverty-stricken mining town run as a private kingdom by a ruthless entrepreneur happy to use agent-provocateurs and Nazi war criminals to keep his wage slaves in line.

When a young protest singer looked likely to become the next Bob Dylan and draw unwelcome publicity, he had to be eliminated – as did the three strangers who drove into town at just the wrong momentâ€¦

Although the heroes provided temporary solutions and put away viciously human criminals, these tales were remarkably blunt in exposing bigger ills and issues that couldn’t be fixed with a wave of a Green Ring; invoking an aura of helplessness that was metaphorically emphasised during this story when Hal was summarily stripped of much of his power for no longer being the willing, unquestioning stooge of his officious, high-and-mighty alien mastersâ€¦

The confused and far-more-mortal Green Lantern discovered another unpalatable aspect of human nature in ‘A Kind of Loving, a Way of Death!’ when Black Canary joined the peripatetic cast. Seeking to renew her relationship with Green Arrow, she was waylaid by bikers, grievously injured and taken in by a charismatic hippy guru. Unfortunately Joshua was more Manson than Messiah and his brand of Peace and Love only extended to white people: everybody else was simply target practiseâ€¦

The plight of Native Americans was stunningly high-lighted in ‘Ulysses Star is Still Alive!’ as corporate logging interests attempted to deprive a mountain tribe of their very last scraps of heritage, once more causing the Green Knights to take extraordinarily differing courses of action to help, whilst #80 added a science fiction gloss to a tale of judicial malfeasance in ‘Even an Immortal Can Die!’ (inked by Dick Giordano).

When the Old Timer used his powers to save Green Lantern rather than prevent a pollution catastrophe in the Pacific Northwest, he was chastised by his fellow Guardians and dispatched to the planet Gallo for judgement by the supreme arbiters of Law in the universe.

His earthly friends accompanied him and found a disturbing new administration with a decidedly off-kilter view of justiceâ€¦

Adams’ staggering facility for capturing likenesses added extra-piquancy to this yarn that we’re just not equipped to grasp four decades later, with the usurping, overbearing villain derived from the Judge of the infamous trial of anti-war protesters â€œThe Chicago Eightâ€.

Insight into the Guardians’ history underpinned ‘Death Be My Destiny!’ when Lantern, Arrow and Canary travelled with the now-sentenced Old Timer to the ancient world of Maltus (that’s a pun, son: just type Thomas Robert Malthus into your search engine of choice or even look in a book) and found a world literally choking on its own out-of-control population. The uncanny cause cast unlovely light on the perceived role and worth of women in modern societyâ€¦

Green Lantern/Green Arrow #82 returned briefly to traditional yarn-spinning in ‘How do you Fight a Nightmare?’ (with additional inks from Berni Wrightson) as Green Lantern’s greatest foe unleashed Harpies, Amazons and all manner of female furies on the hapless hero before Black Canary and Green Arrow could turn the tide, whilst ‘â€¦And a Child Shall Destroy Them!’ crept into Hitchcock country to reintroduce Hal Jordan’s old flame Carol Ferris and take a pop at education and discipline in the chilling tale of a supernal mutant in thrall to a doctrinaire little martinet.

Wrightson also inked #84’s staggering attack on out-of-control consumerism, shoddy cost-cutting and the seduction of bread and circuses in ‘Peril in Plastic’ before the comics world changed forever in the two-part saga ‘Snowbirds Don’t Fly’ and ‘They Say It’ll Kill Meâ€¦But They Won’t Say When!’

Depiction of drug abuse had been strictly proscribed in comicbooks since the advent of the Comics Code Authority, but by 1971 the elephant in the room was too big to ignore and both Marvel and DC addressed the issue in startlingly powerful tales that opened Pandora’s dirty box forever. When the Green Gladiators were drawn into conflict with a vicious heroin-smuggling gang Oliver Queen was horrified to discover his own sidekick had become an addictâ€¦

This sordid, nasty tale did more than merely preach or condemn, but actively sought to explain why young people turned to drugs, just what the consequences could be and even hinted at solutions older people and parents might not want to consider. Forty years on it might all seem a little naÃ¯ve, but the earnest drive to do something and the sheer dark power of the story still delivers a stunning punch.

For all the critical acclaim and astonishingly innovative work done, sales of Green Lantern/Green Arrow were in a critical nosedive and nothing seemed able to stop the rot. Issue #87 featured two solo tales, the first of which ‘Beware My Power!’ introduced a bold new character to the DCU. John Stewart was a radical activist: an angry black man always spoiling for a fight and prepared to take guff from no-one. Hal Jordan was convinced the Guardians had erred when they appointed Stewart as Green Lantern’s official stand-in, but when a bigoted US presidential candidate tried to foment a race war the Emerald Gladiator was forced to change his tune.

Meanwhile bankrupted millionaire Oliver Queen was faced with a difficult decision when the retiring Mayor of Star City invited him to run for his office. ‘What Can One Man Do?’ written by Elliot Maggin, posed fascinating questions for the proud rebel by inviting him to join â€œthe establishmentâ€ he despised, and do some lasting good. The decision was muddied by well-meaning advice from his fellow superheroes and the tragic consequences of a senseless street riotâ€¦

Issue #88 was a collection of reprints (not included here) and the series went out on an evocative, allegorical high note in #89 as ‘â€¦And Through Him Save a Worldâ€¦’ (inked by Adams) pitted jobs and self-interest at Carol Ferris’ aviation company against clean air and pure streams in an naturalistic fable wherein an ecological Christ-figure made the ultimate sacrifice to save our planet and where all the Green Heroes’ power could not affect the outcomeâ€¦

Although the groundbreaking series folded there, the heroics resumed a few months later in the back of The Flash #217 (August-September 1972). ‘The Killing of an Archer!’ began a run of short episodes which eventually led to Green Lantern regaining his own solo series. The O’Neil, Adams & Giordano thriller related how Green Arrow made a fatal mistake and accidentally ended the life of a criminal he was battling. Devastated, the broken swashbuckler abandoned his life and headed for the wilderness to atone or dieâ€¦

The next episode ramped up the tension as a plot against the Archer was uncovered by Green Lantern and Black Canary in ‘Green Arrow is Dead!’ whilst ‘The Fate of an Archer’ saw Canary critically injured and GL track down Oliver Queen just in time to save her lifeâ€¦

Dick Giordano assumed full illustration duties with ‘Duel for a Death List!’ and the concluding ‘Death-Threat on Titan!’ (Flash #220-221) as the feature returned to its science fiction roots to concentrate solely on Green Lantern once more. In this pacy yarn aliens with an ancient link to the GL Corps began eliminating ring-wielders in preparation for a fantastic strike against the Guardians of the Universe.

Issue #223 continued the interstellar intrigue as an alien interloper attacked in ‘Doomsdayâ€¦ Minus Ten Minutes!’ whilst the next issue presented a clever, thoroughly grounded crime-caper ‘Yellow is a Dirty Little Color!’

In #226-Neal Adams drew his last GL tale ‘The Powerless Power Ring!’ before Dick Dillin, Giordano & Giacoia completed the trilogy in #227-228 with ‘My Ringâ€¦ My Enemy!’ and ‘My Enemyâ€¦ Myself!’ wherein atmospheric phenomena, bad mushrooms and invading aliens all combined to make the will-powered weapon a lethal liability.

Flash #230-231 featured ‘The Man From Yesterday!’ and ‘The Man of Destiny!’ (Dillin & Tex Blaisdell) as GL saved one of America’s Revolutionary heroes from aliens who had shanghaied him centuries previously, whilst #233-234 ‘World That Bet on War!’ & ‘And the Winner is Death!’ (Dillin, Terry Austin & Giordano) pitted the Emerald Avenger against gambling-crazed extraterrestrials who used soldiers from Earth history as their games-piecesâ€¦

With Flash #237-238 and 240-243 new art sensation Mike Grell came aboard for a six part saga that precipitated Green Lantern back into his own title. Beginning with ‘Let There Be Darkness!’ (inked by Bill Draut) the watchword was â€œcosmicâ€ as the extra-galactic Ravagers of Olys undertook six destructive, unholy tasks in Green Lantern’s space sector. After thwarting their scheme to occlude the sun over planet Zerbon, destroying the photosynthetic inhabitants, the hero picked up a semi-sentient starfish sidekick in ‘The Day of the Falling Sky!’(Blaisdell inks) whilst preventing the artificial world of Vivarium from collapsing in upon itself.

‘The Floods Will Come!’ brought the Olys to planets Archos, where they attempted to submerge all the landmasses and drown the stone-age dwellers thriving there and Jotham, where the Ravagers almost extinguished the sun in ‘To Kill a Star!’

Earth was the target in ‘All Creatures Great and Small!’ as the Olys used their incredible technology to shrink all mammals but no sooner had Green Lantern negated that threat than the invaders’ de-evolutionary weapons were activated in ‘Dust of the Earth!’ (Austin inks).

Luckily a hominid GL was even more formidable than his Homo Sapiens selfâ€¦

The buzz of the O’Neil/Grell epic assured Green Lantern of his own series once more, but before the re-launch Flash #345-346 presented one last two-part, back-up bonanza as Dillin & Austin illustrated the eerie mutation of vegetable-themed villain Jason Woodrue who transformed himself into a horrendous monster in ‘Perilous Plan of the Plant Master!’ before subjecting GL to ‘The Fury of the Floronic Man!‘

From challenging tales of social injustice back to plot-driven sagas of wit and courage, packed with a shining, optimistic sense of wonder and bristling with high-octane action, these evergreen adventures signalled the end of the Silver Age of Comics. Illustrated by some of the most revered names in the business, the exploits in this volume closed one chapter in the life of Green Lantern and opened the doors to today’s sleek and stellar sentinel of the stars.

June 19, 2011June 15, 2011

Showcase Presents Metamorpho, the Element Man

By Bob Haney, Ramona Fradon, Joe Orlando, Sal Trapani, Charles Paris & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-0762-5

By the time Metamorpho, the Element Man was introduced to the costumed hero-obsessed world the first vestiges of a certifiable boom were just becoming apparent. As such the light-hearted, almost absurdist take struck a right-time, right-place chord, blending far out adventure with tongue-in-cheek comedy.

The character debuted in Brave and the Bold #57 (December 1964-January 1965) and after a follow-up try-out in the next issue catapulted into his own title for an eclectic and oddly engaging 17-issue run. This canny monochrome compendium collects all those eccentric adventures plus team-up tales from Brave and the Bold #66 and 68 and Justice League of America #42

Unlike most of these splendid Showcase editions the team-up stories here are not re-presented in original publication order but closeted together at the back, so if stringent continuity is important to you the always informative credit-pages will enable to navigate the wonderment in the correct sequenceâ€¦

‘The Origin of Metamorpho’ written by Bob Haney (who created the character and wrote everything except the JLA story) with art from Ramona Fradon & Charles Paris, introduced glamorous he-man Soldier of Fortune Rex Mason, who worked as a globe-trotting artefact procurer and agent for ruthlessly acquisitive scientific genius/business tycoon Simon Stagg. Mason was obnoxious and insolent but his biggest fault as far as his boss was concerned was that the mercenary loved and was loved by the millionaire’s only daughter Sapphireâ€¦

Determined to rid himself of Mason, Stagg dispatched him to retrieve a fantastic artefact dubbed the Orb of Ra from the lost pyramid of Ahk-Ton in Egypt, accompanied only by Java, a previously fossilised Neanderthal corpse Rex had discovered in a swamp and which (whom?) Stagg had restored to full life. Mason planned to take his final fabulous fee and whisk Sapphire away from her controlling father foreverâ€¦

Utterly faithful to the scientific wizard, Java sabotaged the mission and left Mason to die in the tomb, victim of an ancient, glowing meteor. The man-brute rushed back to his master, carrying the Orb and fully expecting Stagg to honour his promise and give him Sapphire in marriage.

Trapped, knowing his time had come; Mason swallowed a suicide pill as the scorching rays of the star-stone burned through himâ€¦

Rex did not die but mutated into a ghastly chemical freak capable of shape-shifting and transforming into any of the elements or compounds that comprised the human body: carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, calcium, iron, cobalt and so many othersâ€¦

Hungry for vengeance, Mason followed and confronted his betrayers but was overcome by the alien energies of the Orb of Ra. An uneasy dÃ©tente was declared as Mason accepted Stagg’s desperate offer to cure him â€¦if possible.

The rich man was further horrified when Rex revealed his condition to Sapphire and found she still loved him. Totally unaware of Stagg’s true depths of duplicity, Mason began working for the tycoon as a metahuman problem-solver: Metamorpho, the Element Man.

Brave and the Bold #58 (February-March 1965) revealed more of Stagg’s closeted skeletons when old partner Maxwell Tremayne kidnapped the Element Man and later abducted Sapphire in ‘The Junkyard of Doom!’ The deranged armaments manufacturer was once intimately acquainted with the girl’s mother and never quite got over itâ€¦

The tryout comics were an unqualified success and Metamorpho promptly debuted in his own title, cover-dated July-August 1965 just as the wildly tongue-in-cheek â€œHigh Campâ€ craze was catching on in all areas of popular culture; blending ironic vaudevillian kitsch with classic movie premises as theatrical mad scientists and scurrilous spies began to appear everywhere.

‘Attack of the Atomic Avenger’ saw nuclear nut-job Kurt Vornak try to crush Stagg Industries only to be turned into a deadly, planet-busting radioactive super-atom, whilst ‘Terror from the Telstar’ pitted the charismatic cast against Nicholas Balkan, a ruthless criminal boss determined to sabotage America’s Space program.

Mad multi-millionaire T.T. Trumbull used his own daughter Zelda to get to Simon Stagg through his heart (accidentally proving to everyone who knew him that the old goat actually had one) as part of his attempt to seize control of America in ‘Who Stole the U.S.A.?’ but the ambitious would-be despot backed up the scheme with an incredible robot specifically designed to destroy Metamorpho. Happily Rex Mason’s guts and ingenuity proved more effective than the Element Man’s astonishing powersâ€¦

America saved, the dysfunctional family headed South of the Border becoming embroiled in ‘The Awesome Escapades of the Abominable Playboy’ as Stagg tried to marry Sapphire off to Latino Lothario Cha Cha Chavez. The wilful girl thought she was just making Mason jealous and had no idea of her dad’s true plans and Stagg senior had no conception of Chavez’s real intentions or connections to the local tin-pot dictatorâ€¦

With this issue the gloriously stylish Ramona Fradon left the series to be replaced by two artists who strove to emulate her unique manner of drawing with varying degrees of success. Luckily veteran inker Charles Paris stayed on to smooth out the rough edgesâ€¦

First up was E.C. veteran Joe Orlando whose two issue tenure began with the outrageous doppelganger drama ‘Will the Real Metamorpho Please Stand Up?’ wherein eccentric architect Edifice K. Bulwark tried to convince Rex Mason to lend his abilities to his chemical skyscraper project. When Metamorpho declined Bulwark and Stagg decided to create their own Element Man… with predictably disastrous consequences.

‘Never Bet Against an Element Man!’ (#6 May-June 1966) took the team to the French Riviera as gambling grandee Achille Le Heele snookered Simon Stagg and won â€œownershipâ€ of Metamorpho. The Creepy Conchon’s ultimate goal necessitated stealing the world’s seven greatest wonders (such as the Taj Mahal and Eiffel Tower) and only the Element Man could make that happenâ€¦

Sal Trapani took over the pencilling with #7’s ‘Terror from Fahrenheit 5,000!’ as the acronymic super-spy fad hit hard and Metamorpho was enlisted by the C.I.A. to stop suicidal maniac Otto Von Stuttgart from destroying the entire planet by dropping a nuke into the Earth’s core, whilst costumed villain Doc Dread could only be countered by an undercover Metamorpho becoming ‘Element Man, Public Enemy!’ in a diabolical caper of doom and double-crossâ€¦

Metamorpho #9 moved into the realm of classic fantasy when suave and sinister despot El Mantanzas marooned the cast in ‘The Valley That Time Forgot!’ to battle cavemen and antediluvian alien automatons before a new catalysing element was added in ‘The Sinister Snares of Stingaree!’ with the introduction of Urania Blackwell – a secret agent who had somehow been transformed into an Element Girl with all Metamorpho’s incredible abilities. Not only was she dedicated to eradicating evil such as the criminal cabal Cyclops, but Urania was also the perfect paramour for Rex Masonâ€¦ he even cancelled his wedding to Sapphire to go gang-busting with herâ€¦

With a new frisson of sexual chemistry sizzling beneath the surface, ‘They Came From Beyond?’ found the conflicted Element Man battling an apparent alien invasion whilst ‘The Trap of the Test-Tube Terrors!’ saw another attempt to cure Rex Mason of his unwanted powers allow mad scientist Franz Zorb access to Stagg Industry labs long enough to build an army of chemical horrors.

The plot thickened with Zorb’s theft of a Nucleonic Moleculizer, prompting a continuation in #14 wherein Urania was abducted only to triumphantly experience ‘The Return From Limbo’â€¦

Events and stories grew increasingly outlandish and outrageous as the TV superhero craze intensified and ‘Enter the Thunderer!’ (#14, September-October 1967) saw Rex pulled between Sapphire and Urania as the extraterrestrial Neutrog terrorised the planet in preparation for the awesome arrival of his mighty mutant master. The next instalment heralded an ‘Hour of Armageddon!’ as the uniquely menacing Thunderer assumed control of Earth until boy genius Billy Barton assisted the Elemental defenders in defeating the mutant horror.

Trapani inked himself for Metamorpho #16; an homage to H. Rider Haggard’s â€œSheâ€ wherein ‘Jezeba, Queen of Fury!’ changed the Element Man’s life forever. When Sapphire Stagg married playboy Wally Bannister, the heartbroken Element Man undertook a mission to find the lost city of Ma-Phoor. Here he encountered an undying beauty who wanted to conquer the world and just happened to be Sapphire’s exact double.

Moreover the immortal empress of a lost civilisation had once loved an Element Man of her own: a Roman named Algon who had been transformed into a chemical warrior two millennia previously. Believing herself reunited with her lost love Jezeba finally launched her long-delayed attack on the outside world with disastrous, tragic consequencesâ€¦

The strangely appetising series came to a shuddering and unsatisfactory halt with the next issue as the superhero bubble burst and costumed comic characters suffered their second recession in fifteen years. Metamorpho was one of the first casualties, cancelled just as (or perhaps because) the series was emerging from its quirky comedic shell with the March-April 1968 issue.

‘Last Mile for an Element Man!’, illustrated by Jack Sparling, saw Mason tried and executed for the murder of Wally Bannister, resurrected by Urania Blackwell and set on the trail of true killer Algon. Along the way Mason and Element Girl uncovered a vast, incredible conspiracy and rededicated themselves to defending humanity at all costs. The tale ended on a never-resolved cliffhanger: when Metamorpho was revived a few years later no mention was ever made of these last game-changing issuesâ€¦

The elemental entertainment doesn’t end here though as this tome somewhat expiates the frustrating denouement with three terrific team-up tales beginning with Brave and the Bold #66 (June-July 1966) ‘Wreck the Renegade Robots’ as a mad scientist usurped control of the Metal Men just as their creator Will Magnus was preoccupied turning Metamorpho back into an ordinary mortal.

Two issues later (B& B #68October-November 1966) the still Chemically Active Crime-buster was battling the Penguin, Joker and Riddler as well as a fearsomely mutated Caped Crusader in the thoroughly bizarre ‘Alias the Bat-Hulk!’ – both tales courtesy of Haney, Mike Sekowsky & Mike Esposito.

Sekowsky also drew the last story in this volume. Justice League of America #42 (February 1966) had the hero join the World’s Greatest Superheroes to defeat a cosmic menace deemed â€œthe Unimaginableâ€. The grateful champions instantly offered him membership but were surprised when and why ‘Metamorpho Saysâ€¦ No!’ in a classic adventure written by Gardner Fox and inked by Bernard Sachs.

The wonderment finally subsides after a lovely pin-up of the Element Man and his core cast by Fradon and Paris.

Individually enticing, always exciting but oddly frustrating in total this book will delight readers who aren’t too wedded to cloying continuity but simply seek a few moments of casual, fantastic escapism.
Â© 1965-1967, 2005 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

June 15, 2011June 11, 2011

Showcase Presents The House of Secrets volume 1

By various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-84856-054-3

American comicbooks started slowly until the creation of superheroes unleashed a torrent of creative imitation and invented a new genre. Implacably vested in the Second World War, the Overman swept all before him (and very occasional her or it) until the troops came home and the more traditional genres resurfaced and eventually supplanted the Fights ‘n’ Tights crowd.

Although new kids kept up the buying, much of the previous generation also retained their four-colour habit but increasingly sought older themes in the reading matter. The war years altered the psychological landscape of the world and as a more world-weary, cynical young public came to see that all the fighting and dying hadn’t really changed anything, their chosen forms of entertainment (film and prose as well as comics) reflected this. As well as Western, War and Crime comics, celebrity tie-ins, madcap escapist comedy and anthropomorphic funny animal features were immediately resurgent, but gradually another of the cyclical revivals of spiritualism and public fascination with the arcane led to a wave of increasingly impressive, evocative and shocking horror comics.

There had been grisly, gory and supernatural stars before, including a pantheon of ghosts, monsters and wizards draped in mystery-man garb and trappings (the Spectre, Mr. Justice, Sgt. Spook, Frankenstein, The Heap, Sargon the Sorcerer, Zatara, Zambini the Miracle Man, Kardak the Mystic, Dr. Fate and dozens of others), but these had been victims of circumstance: the Unknown as a power source for super-heroics. Now the focus shifted to ordinary mortals thrown into a world beyond their ken with the intention of unsettling, not vicariously empowering the reader.

Almost every publisher jumped on the increasingly popular bandwagon, with B & I (which became the magical one-man-band Richard E. Hughes’ American Comics Group) launching the first regularly published horror comic in the Autumn of 1948, although Adventures Into the Unknown was technically pipped by Avon who had released an impressive single issue entitled Eerie in January 1947 before launching a regular series in 1951, by which time Classics Illustrated had already long milked the literary end of the medium with adaptations of the Headless Horseman, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (both 1943), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1944) and Frankenstein (1945) among others.

If we’re keeping score this was also the period in which Joe Simon and Jack Kirby identified another â€œmature marketâ€ gap and invented the Romance comic (Young Romance #1, September 1947) but they too saw the sales potential for spooky material, resulting in the seminal Black Magic (launched in 1950) and boldly obscure psychological drama anthology Strange World of Your Dreams (1952).

The company that would become DC Comics bowed to the inevitable and launched a comparatively straight-laced anthology that nevertheless became one of their longest-running and most influential titles with the December 1951/January 1952 launch of The House of Mystery.

When the hysterical censorship scandal which led to witch-hunting hearings (feel free to type Senate Subcommittee on Juvenile Delinquency, April- June 1954 into your search engine at any timeâ€¦ You can do that because it’s apparently a free country now) was curtailed by the industry adopting a castrating straitjacket of self regulatory rules. Horror titles produced under the aegis of the Comics Code Authority were sanitised and anodyne affairs in terms of Shock and Gore but the appetite for suspense was still high and in 1956 National introduced the sister title House of Secrets which debuted with a November-December cover-date.

Stories were dialled back into marvellously illustrated, rationalistic, fantasy-adventure vehicles which dominated the market until the 1960s when super-heroes (which had started to creep back after Julius Schwartz began the Silver Age of comics by reintroducing the Flash in Showcase #4, 1956) finally overtook them. Green Lantern, Hawkman, the Atom and a slew of other costumed cavorters generated a gaudy global bubble of masked mavens which even forced the dedicated anthology suspense titles to transform into super-character split-books with Martian Manhunter and Dial H for Hero in House of Mystery and Mark Merlin -later Prince Ra-Man – sharing space with Eclipso (see Showcase Presents Eclipso) in House of Secrets.

When the caped crusader craziness peaked and popped, Secrets was one of the first casualties and the title folded with #80, the September-October 1966 issue.

However nothing combats censorship better than falling profits and at the end of the 1960s the Silver Age superhero boom was over, with many titles gone and some of the industry’s most prestigious series circling the drain tooâ€¦

This real-world Crisis led to the surviving publishers of the field agreeing to loosen their self-imposed restraints against crime and horror comics. Nobody much cared about gangster titles but as the liberalisation coincided with another bump in public interest in all aspects of the Worlds Beyond, the resurrection of scary stories was a foregone conclusion and obvious â€œno-brainer.â€ Even ultra-wholesome Archie Comics re-entered the field with their rather tasty line of Red Circle Chillersâ€¦

Thus with absolutely no fanfare at all House of Secrets was resurrected with issue #81, cover-dated August-September 1969 – just as big sister The House of Mystery had done a year earlier.

Under a spooky bold banner declaiming â€œThere’s No Escape Fromâ€¦ The House of Secretsâ€ writer Mike Friedrich, Jerry Grandenetti & George Roussos introduced a ramshackle, sentient old pile in ‘Don’t Move It!’ after which Bill Draut illustrated the introduction of caretaker Abel (with a guest-shot by his murderous older brother Cain from HoM) in ‘House of Secrets’, after which the portly porter kicked off his storytelling career with the Gerry Conway & Jack Sparling yarn ‘Aaron Philip’s Photo Finish!’, and the inaugural issue was put to bed with a Draut limned ‘Epilogue’â€¦

There are no scripter credits for most of HoS #82 but Draut drew both ‘Welcome to the House of Secrets‘ and the ‘Epilogue’, whilst cinema shocker ‘Realer Than Real’ was illustrated by Werner Roth & Vince Colletta. ‘Sudden Madness’ was a short sci fi saga from the brush of Dick Giordano, ‘The Little Old Winemaker’ (Sparling art) a salutary tale of murder and revenge and ‘The One and Only, Fully-Guaranteed, Super-Permanent, 100%’ – written by Marv Wolfman and realised by Dick Dillin & Neal Adams – a darkly comedic tale of domestic bliss and how to get itâ€¦

After Draut & Giordano’s ‘Welcome to the House of Secrets‘ piece superstar Alex Toth made his modern HoS debut with the Wolfman written fantasy ‘The Stuff That Dreams are Made Of’, Mikes Royer & Peppe visualised the sinister love-story of ‘Bigger Than a Breadbox’ and Conway & Draut revived time-honoured gothic menace for a chilling fable ‘The House of Endless Years’.

Conway & Draut maintained the light-hearted bracketing of the stories as #84 began with ‘If I Had but World Enough and Time’ (Wein, Dillin & Peppe), a cautionary tale about too much television, after which the tension grew with Wolfman & Sid Greene’s warning against wagering in ‘Double or Nothing!’ and an utterly manic parable of greed ‘The Unbelievable! The Unexplained!’ (by Steve Skeates, Sparling & Jack Abel), before Wein & Sparling messed with our dreams in ‘If I Should Die before I Wakeâ€¦‘

Cain and Abel acrimoniously opened HoS #85 after which Wein & Don Heck disclosed what happens to some ‘People Who Live in Glass Housesâ€¦’ whilst art-legend Ralph Reese illustrated Wein’s daftly ironic ‘Reggie Rabbit, Heathcliffe Hog, Archibald Aardvark, J. Benson Babboon and Bertram the Dancing Frog’â€¦

John Costanza contributed a comedy page entitled ‘House of Wacks’ and Conway, Gil Kane & Neal Adams heralded the upcoming age of slick and seductive barbarian fantasy with the gloriously vivid and vital ‘Second Chance’. Issue #86 featured the eerily seductive ‘Strain’ with art by George Tuska, a powerful prose puzzler ‘The Golden Tower of the Sun’ written by Conway with illustrations from Gray Morrow, after which the writer and Bill Draut tugged heartstrings and stunned senses in the moving, moody madness of ‘The Ballad of Little Joe’â€¦

The issue ends with an episode of the peripatetic, post-apocalyptic, ironic occasional series ‘The Day after Doomsday’ courtesy of Wein and Sparling.

The chatty introductions and interludes with Abel were gradually diminishing to make way for longer stories and experimental episodes such as #87’s ‘And in the Darknessâ€¦ Light’, sub-divided into ‘Death Has Marble Lips!’, a sculptural shocker from Robert Kanigher, Dillin & Giordano; sinister sci fi scenario ‘The Man’ from Wolfman, Ross Andru & Mike Esposito and the excellent weird pulp pastiche ‘The Coming of Ghaglan’ by veteran Raymond Marais & talented newcomer Michael Wm. Kaluta. Much the same was #88’s dread duo ‘The Morning Ghost’ by Wolfman, Dillin & Frank Giacoia and ‘Eyesore!’ by Conway & Draut.

Most of the covers were the magnificent work of Neal Adams but HoS #89 sports a rare and surprisingly effective tonal image by Irv Novick (although attributed here to Gray Morrow): a gothic romance special with period thrillers ‘Where Dead Men Walk!’ which is drawn by Morrow and ‘A Taste of Dark Fire!’ from Conway & Heck. This latter tale debuted Victorian devil-busting duo Father John Christian and Rabbi Samuel Shulman who appeared far too infrequently in succeeding years (see also Showcase Presents the Phantom Stranger volume 2).

Tuska illustrated the uncredited futuristic thriller ‘The Distant Dome’ in #90, whilst Wolfman, Rich Buckler & Adams described the short, sharp lives of ‘The Symbionts’, after which Mike Friedrich & Morrow ended this S-F extravaganza with the perplexing tale of ‘Jedediah!’

There are no writer’s credits for #91 but South American revolutionary rollercoaster ‘The Eagle’s Talon!’ was drawn by Wally Wood; Jack Sparling illustrated the faux-factual feature ‘Realm of the Mystics’, Sam Glanzman produced a potent parable of alienation in ‘Please, Don’t Cry Johnny!’ and Murphy Anderson wrapped up the wonderment with a deadly doppelganger drama ‘There are Two of Meâ€¦ and One Must Die!’

Issue #92 was one of those rare moments in comics when all the factors are in perfect alignment for a major breakthrough. The twelfth anthology issue of House of Secrets cemented the genre into place as the industry leader. In it writer Len Wein and artist Bernie Wrightson produced a throwaway thriller set at the turn of the 19th century, wherein gentleman scientist Alex Olsen is murdered by his best friend and his body dumped in a swamp. Years later his beloved bride, now the unsuspecting wife of the murderer, is stalked by a shambling, disgusting beast that seems to be composed of mud and muckâ€¦

‘Swamp Thing’ was cover-featured and eerily illustrated by Wrightson for HoS #92 (June-July 1971) striking an instant and sustained chord with the buying public. It was the bestselling DC comic of that month and reader response was fervent and persistent. By all accounts the only reason there wasn’t an immediate sequel or spin-off was that the creative team didn’t want to produce one.

Eventually however, bowing to interminable pressure, and with the sensible idea of transplanting the concept to contemporary America, the first issue of Swamp Thing (see Swamp Thing: Dark Genesis) appeared on newsstands in the Spring of 1972. It was an instant hit and an immortal classic.

The remaining pages in that groundbreaking issue aren’t bad either, with Jack Kirby & Mark Evanier scripting the psychodrama ‘After I Die’ for old Prize/Crestwood Comics stable-mate Bill Draut to illustrate, whilst ‘It’s Better to Giveâ€¦’ by Virgil North provided an early chance for Al Weiss & Tony DeZuniga to strut their superbly engaging artistic stuff. The issue ends with a sudden shocker by Dick Dillin (possibly via Grandenetti?) entitled ‘Trick or Treat’

House of Secrets #93 (August/September 1971) saw the comicbook expand from 32 to 52 pages – as did all DC’s titles for the next couple of years, opening the doors for a magnificent period of new material married to the best of the company’s prodigious archives for an appreciative, impressionable audience.

Jim Aparo made his HoS debut here in the Skeates scripted spook-fest ‘Lonely in Death’ and so did macabre cartoonist Sergio AragonÃ©s in ‘Abel’s Fables’, after which the reprint bonanza began with ‘The Curse of the Cat’s Cradle’ (originally from My Greatest Adventure #85) stupendously depicted by Alex Toth. Jack Abel’s ‘Nightmare’ was followed by golden oldie ‘The Beast From the Box’; courtesy of Nick Cardy and House of Mystery #24, after which Lore (Shoberg) contributed another page of ‘Abel’s Fables’ before the entertainment ended with the chilling ‘Never Kill a Witch’s Son!’ by John Albano & DeZuniga, rounding out the fearsome fun in period styleâ€¦

Issue #94 began by revealing ‘The Man with My Face’ (art by Sparling) and ‘Hydeâ€¦ and Go Seek!’ by Wein & DeZuniga, whilst ‘The Day Nobody Died’ (George Roussos, Tales of the Unexpected #9) and ‘Track of the Invisible Beast!’ (Toth from House of Mystery #109) provided vintage voltage before another AragonÃ©s ‘Abel’s Fables’ and ‘A Bottle of Incenseâ€¦ a Whiff of the Past!’ by Francis Bushmaster, Weiss & Wrightson closed proceedings in devilishly high styleâ€¦

Albano & Heck showed domesticity wasn’t pretty in ‘Creatureâ€¦‘, everybody got a nasty case of chills in ‘And Thing That Go Bump in the Night!’ (credited to Sparling but probably Tuska & Win Mortimer) before ‘The Last Sorcerer’ (Bernard Baily from House of Mystery #69) and ‘The Phantom of the Flames!’ – a rare DC illustration job for the great Joe Maneely from HoM #71. The dark dramas closed with Jack Oleck and Nestor Redondo’s ‘The Bride of Death’. Issue #95 also included a couple of Lore’s ‘Abel’s Fables’, a Sparling ‘Realm of the Mystics’ and a Wein & Sparling ‘Day after Doomsday’.

‘World for a Witch’ by Oleck & Draut opened the next peril-packed issue, followed by a high-tension, high-tech Toth reprint ‘The Great Dimensional Brain Swap’ (from House of Secrets #48) and Wein, Dillin & Jack Abel’s ‘Be it Ever So Humbleâ€¦’ whilst Oleck & Wood’s ‘The Monster’ described a different kind of horror before ‘The Indestructible Man’ (by unsung master-draughtsman Bill Ely, and originally seen in Tales of the Unexpected #12) closed the show. Also lurking within this issue was another agonisingly funny AragonÃ©s ‘Abel’s Fables’ contributionâ€¦

The penultimate issue in this sparkling collection led with classical creep-show ‘The Curse of Morby Castle’ by Sparling. Skeates & Aparo returned to ‘Divide and Murder’ and AragonÃ©s struck again in ‘Abel’s Fables’. Blasts from the past ‘The Tomb of Ramfis’ (House of Mystery #59, by the fabulous John Prentice) and ‘Dead Man’s Diary’ (drawn by Ralph Mayo for House of Mystery #46) were demarcated by another trenchant Wein & Sparling ‘Day after Doomsday’, before Jose Delbo delineated a manic monster-fest entitled ‘Domain of the Damned’.

The last issue in this first compendium opened with a glorious intro page from Mark Hanerfeld and Kaluta, after which the artist entrancingly illustrated Albano’s tough-as-nails-thriller ‘Born Losers’ and Toth illuminated the ‘Secret Hero of Center City’ (originally seen in House of Mystery #120). After one more AragonÃ©s ‘Abel’s Fables’ Wein, Mikes Roy & Peppe revealed why ‘The Night Train Doesn’t Stop Here anymore!’ and another John Prentice treat was served up in ‘The Fatal Superstition’ (House of Mystery #35) before the great Adolfo Buylla celebrated the end of the affair in grisly fashion with ‘Happy Birthday, Herman!’

These terror-tales captivated the reading public and critics alike when they first appeared and it’s no stretch to posit that they probably saved the company during one of the toughest downturns in comics publishing history. Now their blend of sinister mirth, classic horror scenarios and suspense set-pieces can most familiarly be seen in such children’s series as Goosebumps, Horrible Histories and their many imitators.

If you crave beautifully realised, tastefully splatter-free sagas of tension and imagination, not to mention a huge supply of bad-taste, kid-friendly cartoon chills, book your stay at the House of Secrets as soon as you possibly canâ€¦

June 13, 2011June 10, 2011

Showcase Presents Justice League of America volume 5

By Mike Friedrich, Len Wein, Dick Dillin & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-0-85768-195-9

After the actual invention of the comicbook superhero – for which read the Action Comics debut of Superman in 1938 – the most significant event in the industry’s progress was the combination of individual sales-points into a group. Thus what seems blindingly obvious to us with the benefit of four-colour hindsight was proven: a number of popular characters could multiply readership by combining forces. Plus, of course, a mob of superheroes is just so much cooler than one (â€¦or one-and-a-half if there’s a sidekick involvedâ€¦).

And so the Justice Society of America is rightly revered as a true landmark in the development of comicbooks and when Julius Schwartz revived the superhero genre in the late 1950s, the key moment came with the inevitable banding together of the reconfigured mystery men.

That moment came with issue #28 of The Brave and the Bold, a classical adventure title that had recently transformed into a try-out magazine like Showcase. Just before Christmas 1959 the ads began running. â€œJust Imagine! The mightiest heroes of our timeâ€¦ have banded together as the Justice League of America to stamp out the forces of evil wherever and whenever they appear!â€

The rest was history: the JLA captivated the youth of a nation, reinvigorated an industry and even inspired a small family-concern into creating the Fantastic Four, thereby transforming the art-form itself

Following a spectacular rise, TV spin-offs brought international awareness which led to catastrophic overexposure: by 1968 the superhero boom looked to be dying just as its predecessor had at the end of the 1940s. Sales were down generally in the industry and costs were beginning to spiral. More importantly â€œfreeâ€ entertainment, in the form of television, was by now ensconced in even the poorest household. If you were a kid in the sixties, think just how many brilliant cartoon shows were created in that decade, when artists like Alex Toth and Doug Wildey worked in West Coast animation studios.

Moreover, comicbook heroes were now appearing on the small screen. Superman, Aquaman, Batman, the Marvel heroes and even the JLA were there every Saturday in your own living room even after the global bubble had burstâ€¦

It was a time of great political and social upheaval. Change was everywhere and unrest even reached the corridors of DC. When a number of creators agitated for increased work-benefits the request was not looked upon kindly. Many left the company – not always voluntarily – for other outfits. Some quit the business altogether.

This fifth monochrome volume compellingly reflects the signs of the times as new writers fostered a â€œnew waveâ€ before slowly and safely returning the World’s Greatest Superheroes to the tried and tested Fights ‘n’ Tights arenaâ€¦

Collecting issues #84-106 (and re-presenting the stirring covers of #85 and 93: giant editions which reprinted issues #10-11and #13 and18, respectively), this tome covers the period when the market changed forever, and comics stopped being a casual, disposable mass-entertainment.

By the end of this volume the publishers had begun the conceptual and commercial transition from a mass-market medium which slavishly followed trends and fashions to become a niche industry producing only what its dedicated fans wantedâ€¦

The dramas begin here with Justice League of America #84 (November 1970) and a guest-script from veteran writer Robert Kanigher illustrated by Dick Dillin & Joe Giella. ‘The Devil in Paradise!’ wherein a well-meaning but demented scientist builds his own Eden to escape the world’s increasing savagery before attempting to cleanse the Earth and start civilisation afresh.

With superheroes on the outs the team was severely truncated too. Issue #86 tackled impending global starvation as Mike Friedrich began a run of excellent eco-thrillers with ‘Earth’s Final Hour!’ as businessman Theo Zappa traded away the planet’s plankton (base of our entire food-chain) to a race of aliens with only Superman, Batman, Flash, Aquaman, Atom and Hawkman on hand to thwart him, whilst #87’s ‘Batmanâ€¦ King of the World!’ brought in occasional guest-star Zatanna and the semi-retired Green Lantern to tackle a deadly alien robot raider: a devious and cleverly veiled attack on Big Business and the Vietnam war, most famous these days for introducing a group of alien superheroes mischievously based on Marvels Mighty Avengersâ€¦

The human spirit and enduring humanity were highlighted when ancient refugees from the lost city of Mu returned to find us in charge of the planet they had abandoned millennia ago. ‘The Last Survivors of Earth!’ showed that even when superheroes were outmatched by scientifically-instigated global catastrophes, the simple patience, charity and self-confidence of ordinary folks can move mountains and save worlds.

‘The Most Dangerous Dreams of All!’ is one of the oddest tales in JLA history with a thinly disguised Harlan Ellison psychically inserting himself into the consciousness of Superman and Batman to woo the Black Canary with near-fatal repercussions, in a self-indulgent but intriguing examination of the creative process whilst #90’s ‘Plague of the Pale People!’ saw Aquaman’s submerged kingdom of Atlantis conquered by a primitive sub-sea tribe (the Saremites from Flash #109 – for which story check out Showcase Presents the Flash volume 1) using nerve gas negligently dumped in the ocean by theÂ US military.

In a mordant and powerful parable about lost faith and taking responsibility the JLA were forced to deal with problems much tougher than repelling invaders and locking up bad-guysâ€¦

Justice League of America #91 (August 1971) began the hero-heavy first part of the annual JLA/JSA team-up with ‘Earthâ€¦ the Monster-Maker!’ as the Supermen, Flashes, Green Lanterns, Hawkmen, Atoms and Robins of two separate Realities simultaneously and ineffectually battled an alien boy and his symbiotically-linked dog on two planets a universe apart, until ‘Solomon Grundyâ€¦ the One and Only!’ gave them a life saving lesson on togetherness and lateral thinkingâ€¦

Following the cover of reprint giant #93, Neal Adams stepped in to provide additional pencils for the tense mystery ‘Where Strikes Demonfang?’ as ghostly guardian Deadman helped Batman, Aquaman and Green Arrow foil a murder mission by the previously infallible Merlyn and the League of Assassins. The issue ended on a cliffhanger as Flash, Green Lantern and Hawkman were lost in a teleporter accident leaving Batman, Black Canary, Green Arrow and the Atom to fight ‘The Private War of Johnny Dune!’ wherein a disaffected black Vietnam veteran discovered the power and temptation of superpowers. Tragically even the ability to control minds wasn’t enough to change an unjust society two hundred years in the makingâ€¦

The JLA returned to large-scale cosmic drama with issue #96 as Superman located the lost Leaguers on the distant yet familiar world of Rann (at least if you’ve read Showcase Presents Adam Strange volume 1) battling a planet-killing energy vampire in ‘The Coming ofâ€¦ Starbreaker!’

Their hard-won triumph only brought Earth to the attention of the extinction-event-level villain, leading to #97’s ‘The Day the Earth Screams!’ – a 37-page epic incorporating and recapitulating the team’s origin from #9 – resulting in a positively charged team, aided by Golden Age magician Sargon the Sorcerer, finally crushing the Stellar Leech in the climactic ‘No More Tomorrows!’

Environment-in-extremis was once more the theme in #99’s ‘Seeds of Destruction!’ as two alien Johnny Appleseeds began reseeding Earth with plants irrespective of whether or not humans want – or can survive – their monstrous cropâ€¦

Justice League of America #100 (August 1972) heralded the move away from relevancy and hot button social topics and a return to full-on Costumed melodramas beginning with a colossal three way team-up featuring almost every hero in the then-DC pantheon.

Beginning as part of the annual JLA/JSA summer blockbuster ‘The Unknown Soldier of Victory!’ featured the debut of Len Wein as scripter as the assembled champions of two Earths began a monumental hunt through time to retrieve forgotten heroes the Seven Soldiers of Victory; not simply out of common decency but because the vanished vigilantes held the answer to defeating a criminal mastermind literally holding the world of Earth-2 to ransom.

The quest continued in ‘The Hand that Shook the World!’ before ending in one adventurer’s gallant final sacrifice in #102’s ‘And One of Us Must Die!’ (with additional inking from Dick Giordano).

Returned to their own planet the JLA teamed up with and then inducted one of the few mystery men who hadn’t accompanied them to Earth-2 in ‘A Stranger Walks Among Us!’ (Wein, Dillin & Giordano) as the cross-genre horror-hero Phantom Stranger foiled a plot to sorcerously slaughter six Leaguers during the annual Halloween carnival in Rutland, Vermont, after which Green Lantern’s arch-enemy Hector Hammond orchestrated an attack on his old foe by setting an unstoppable monster loose on the League in ‘The Shaggy Man Will Get You if You Don’t Watch Out!’

The â€œMore-the-Merrierâ€ recruitment drive continued in #105 as the Elongated Man signed up to save the day against marauding, malignant putty-men in ‘Specter in the Shadows!’, anonymously aided by a miraculously resurrected robotic Red Tornado who joined up in #106, unaware that he had been reprogrammed into becoming a ‘Wolf in the Fold!’ which neatly concludes this delightful fifth volume of extraordinary exploits.

The Justice League of America has become a keystone of American comics and these tales are still among the most thought-provoking, controversial and purely entertaining episodes in their half-century history.

Just Imagineâ€¦

May 30, 2011May 30, 2011

Showcase Presents DC Comics Presents Superman Team-Ups volume 1

By Martin Pasko, Paul Levitz, Denny O’Neil, JosÃ© Luis GarcÃa-LÃ³pez, Dick Dillin, Joe Staton & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-84856-471-8

From the moment a kid first sees his second superhero the only thing he/she wants is to see how the new gaudy gladiator stacks up against the first. From the earliest days of the funnybook industry (and according to DC Comics Presents editor Julie Schwartz it was the same with the pulps and dime novels that preceded it) we’ve wanted our idols to meet, associate, battle together – and if you follow the Timely/Marvel model, that means against each other – far more than we want to see them trounce their archenemies togetherâ€¦

The concept of team-up books – an established star pairing or battling (usually both) with less well-selling company characters – was far from new when DC awarded their then biggest gun (it was the publicity drenched weeks before the release of Superman: the Movie, and Tim Burton’s Batman was over a decade away) a regular arena to have adventures with other stars of their firmament, just as Batman had been doing since the middle of the 1960s in the Brave and the Bold.

In truth the Man of Steel had already enjoyed the sharing experience once before when World’s Finest Comics briefly ejected the Caped Crusader and Superman battled beside a coterie of heroes including Flash, Robin, Teen Titans, Dr. Fate and others (issues #198-214 November 1970 to October/November 1972) before the immortal status quo was re-established.

This superbly economical monochrome collection re-presents the first twenty-six issues of the star-studded monthly and opens the show with a two-part thriller featuring Barry Allen, the Silver Age Flash who had also been Superman’s first co-star in the aforementioned World’s Finest Comics run.

‘Chase to the End of Time!’ and ‘Race to the End of Time!’ debuted in DC Comics Presents #1-2, (July-August and September-October 1978) as scripter Marty Pasko and the utterly astounding JosÃ© Luis GarcÃa-LÃ³pez (inked by Dan Adkins) rather reprised the World’s Finest tale as warring alien races tricked Superman and Flash into speeding through the time-stream to prevent Earth’s history from being corrupted and destroyed. As if that wasn’t dangerous enough, nobody could predict the deadly intervention of the Scarlet Speedster’s most dangerous foe, Professor Zoom, the Reverse-Flashâ€¦

David Michelinie wrote a tantalising pastiche of classic Adam Strange Mysteries in Space for GarcÃa-LÃ³pez to draw and ink in ‘The Riddle of Little Earth Lost’ wherein the Man of Two Worlds and Man of Steel foiled the cosmic scheme of a deranged genius to transpose, subjugate and/or destroy Earth and light-years distant planet Rann, and Len Wein scripted the superb ‘Sun-Stroke!’ wherein the Action Ace and the madly-malleable Metal Men joined forces to thwart solar-fuelled genius I.Q. and elemental menace Chemo as a ill-considered plan to enhance solar radiation provoked a catastrophic solar-flare.

Sea King Aquaman became embroiled in ‘The War of the Undersea Cities’ (by Wein, Paul Levitz & Murphy Anderson) when his subjects opened hostilities with the mer-folk of Tritonis, home of Superman’s old college girlfriend Lori Lemaris. Fortunately, cooler heads prevailed when the deadly Ocean Master was revealed to be meddling in their sub-sea politics, after which ‘The Fantastic Fall of Green Lantern’ (Levitz, Curt Swan & Francisco Chiaramonte) saw the Man of Steel inherit the awesome power ring after Hal Jordan fell in battle with Star Sapphire.

Although triumphant against his female foe, Superman was ambushed by anti-matter warriors from Qward leading to ‘The Paralyzed Planet Peril!’ (#7, Levitz, Dick Dillin & Chiaramonte) wherein those aliens attempted to colonise Earth until the Red Tornado swept in to the rescue.

‘The Sixty Deaths of Solomon Grundy’ by Steve Englehart & Murphy Anderson featured Swamp Thing (at a time when the bog-beast still believed he was a transformed human and not an enhanced plant) searching the sewers of Metropolis for a cure to his condition, only to stumble onto a battle between the Man of Steel and the mystic zombie who was â€œborn on a Mondayâ€â€¦

Marty Pasko returned to script the Joe Staton & Jack Abel illustrated ‘Invasion of the Ice People!’ wherein Wonder Woman assisted in repelling an attack by malign disembodied intellects before another two-part tale began with ‘The Miracle Man of Easy Company’ (Cary Bates, Staton & Abel) as a super-bomb blasted Superman back to World War II and a meeting with Sgt. Rock, before returning home to battle a brainwashed and power-amplified Hawkman in ‘Murder by Starlight!’ (by Bates, Staton & Chiaramonte).

DCCP #12 featured a duel between the Action Ace and New God Mister Miracle in ‘Winner Take Metropolis’ by Englehart, Richard Buckler & Dick Giordano before Levitz returned to script an ambitious continued epic which began with ‘To Live in Peaceâ€¦ Nevermore!’ (art from Dillin & Giordano), wherein the Legion of Super-Heroes prevented Superman saving a little boy from alien abduction to preserve the integrity of the time-line. It didn’t help that the lad was Jon Ross, son of Clark Kent’s oldest friendâ€¦

Driven mad by loss Pete Ross risked the destruction of reality itself by enlisting the aid of Superboy to battle his older self in ‘Judge, Juryâ€¦ and No Justice!’ (Levitz, Dillin & Giordano) after which the Man of Steel helped scientist-hero Ray Palmer regain his size-changing powers in ‘The Plight of the Giant Atom!’ by Bates, Staton & Chiaramonte.

Issue #16 found Superman and Black Lightning battling a heartsick alien trapped on Earth in ‘The De-volver!’ (Denny O’Neil, Staton & Chiaramonte) after which Gerry Conway, GarcÃa-LÃ³pez & Steve Mitchell heralded the return of Firestorm in ‘The Ice Slaves of Killer Frost!’, a bombastic, saves-the-day epic which brought the Nuclear Man back into the active DC pantheon after a long hiatus.

Zatanna co-starred in the Conway, Dillin & Chiaramonte rollercoaster ride ‘The Night it Rained Magic!’, Batgirl helped solve the eerie mystery ‘Who Haunts This House?’ (O’Neil, Staton & Chiaramonte) and Green Arrow excelled in the gripping, big-business-busting eco-thriller ‘Inferno From the Sky!’ by O’Neil, GarcÃa-LÃ³pez & Joe Giella.

DCCP #21 found the eclectic detective Elongated Man as patient zero in ‘The Alien Epidemic’, a tense medical mystery by Conway, Staton & Chiaramonte, and Mike W. Barr wrote an effective science fiction doom-tale co-starring Captain Comet as the future-man endured ‘The Plight of the Human Comet!’ (art by Dillin & Frank McLaughlin).

‘The Curse Out of Time!’ (#23, O’Neil, Staton & Vince Colletta) affected two separate Earths, compelling Superman and Doctor Fate to defeat imps and ghosts before normality could be restored. The supernatural theme continued in the magnificent team-up with Deadman in #24 wherein Wein & GarcÃa-LÃ³pez revealed the tragic and chilling story of ‘The Man Who Was the World!’

The long unresolved fate of Jon Ross was happily concluded in the cunning and redemptive ‘Judgement Night’ with the enigmatic Phantom Stranger overcoming an insoluble, intolerable situation with Superman, courtesy of Levitz, Dillin & McLaughlin.

This stellar collection concludes with a spectacular return engagement for Green Lantern as Emerald Crusader and Man of Tomorrow battled each other and a trans-dimensional shape-shifter in ‘Between Friend and Foe!’ plotted and pencilled by Jim Starlin, scripted by Marv Wolfman and inked by Steve Mitchell.

These short, pithy adventures act as perfect shop window for DC’s fascinating catalogue of characters and creators; delivering a breadth and variety of self-contained, exciting and satisfying entertainments ranging from the merely excellent all the way to utterly unmissable. This book is the perfect introduction to the DC Universe for every kid of any age and a delightful slice of the ideal Costumed Dramas of a simpler more inviting timeâ€¦

May 25, 2011May 26, 2011

Showcase Presents Booster Gold

By Dan Jurgens & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-84576-852-2

After the cosmos-crunching Crisis on Infinite Earths re-sculpted the DC Universe in the mid-1980s, a host of characters got floor-up rebuilds for the tougher, no-nonsense, straight-shooting New American readership of the Reagan-era and a number of corporate buy-outs such as Blue Beetle, Captain Atom and The Question joined the DC roster with their own much-hyped solo titles. There were even a couple of all-new big launches for the altered sensibilities of the Decade of Excess such as Suicide Squad and a Shiny, Happy Hero named Booster Gold.

This economical black and white edition (released to coincide with the hero’s relaunch as a time-roving chronal cop) features the entire 25 issue run of Booster Gold volume 1 (from February 1986 to February 1988), plus a crossover appearance from Action Comics #594 and his redefined backstory from Secret Origins #35 (December 1988).

The blue and yellow paladin appeared amidst plenty of hoopla in his own title cover-dated February 1986 (the first post-Crisis premiere of the freshly integrated superhero line) and presented a wholly different approach to the traditional DC costumed boy-scout.Â Created, written and drawn by Dan Jurgens with inks by Mike DeCarlo ‘The Big Fall’ introduced a brash, cocky, mysterious metahuman golden-boy jock who had set up his stall as a superhero in Metropolis, actively seeking corporate sponsorships, selling endorsements and with a management team in place to maximise the profit potential of his crusading celebrity.

Accompanied everywhere by a sentient flying-football-shapedÂ robot Skeets, the glitzy showboat soon encountered high-tech criminal gang The 1000 and their super-enforcer Blackguard, earning the ire of sinister mastermind The Director and the shallow approbation of models, actresses, headline-hungry journalists, politicians and the ever fickle publicâ€¦

In issue #2’s ‘Cold Redemption’ Blackguard was assisted by thought-casting mercenary Mindancer as the Director’s campaign of malice led to another close call for Booster. Meanwhile his highly public private life took a tawdry turn in ‘The Night Has a Thousand Eyes’ when opportunistic starlet Monica Lake began briefing the media on her â€œrelationshipâ€ with the Man of Gold. He was unable to refute the claims since he was knee-deep in hired thugs and super-villains at the timeâ€¦

That cataclysmic combat in #4 resulted in a tremendous ‘Crash’ when urban vigilante The Thorn dropped in to help scuttle the 1000’s latest scheme, but once the dust settled Booster found himself in real trouble as business manager Dirk Davis was so busy licensing his boss for a comicbook that he failed to head off an IRS auditâ€¦

It appeared Booster Gold had no official record and had never paid a penny in taxesâ€¦

In ‘Face Off’, our hero saved an entire stadium of ice hockey fans from avaricious terrorist Mr. Twister, earning himself a reprieve from the Federal authorities, after which an alien refugee crashed in Metropolis’ Centennial Park in #6’s ‘To Cross the Rubicon’, just as Man of Gold met Man of Steel for the long-awaited origin saga.

Michael Jon â€œBoosterâ€ Carter was a rising sports star in the 25^th century who fell in with a gambling syndicate and began fixing games for cash pay-outs. When he was caught and banned from competition he could only find menial work as a night-watchman in The Space Museum. Whilst there he struck up a friendship with automated tour-guide and security-bot Skeets, embarking on a bold plan to redeem himself.

Stealing a mysterious flight ring and force-field belt plus energy-rods, an alien super-suit and wrist-blasters, Booster used the Museum’s prize exhibit, Rip Hunter’s time machine, to travel to 20^th Century Age of Heroes and earn all the fame and glory his mistakes had cost him in his own timeâ€¦

Superman, already antagonistic because of Booster’s attitude, is ready to arrest him for theft when the almost forgotten alien attacksâ€¦

They all awaken on a distant world embroiled in a vicious civil war and still at odds. As a result of ‘The Lesson’ and a vicious battle Superman and Booster Gold both learned some uncomfortable truths and agreed to tolerate each other when they returned home. Meanwhile, back in Metropolis, Dirk Davis and company PA Trixie Collins hired hotshot scientist Jack Soo to build a super-suit that would enable Booster to hire a camera-friendly, eye-candy, girly sidekickâ€¦

More questions were answered in the two-part ‘Time Bridge’ when the 30^th century Legion of Super-Heroes discovered evidence that their flight-rings and forcefield technology were being used by a temporal fugitive named Michael Carter. Dispatched to 1985 by the Time Institute, Ultra Boy, Chameleon Boy and Brainiac 5 arrived soon after the fugitive Carter and became involved in his very first case. The Director and shape-shifting assassin Chiller were planning to murder and replace Ronald Reagan but in the best superhero tradition Carter and the Legionnaires misunderstood each other’s intentions and butted headsâ€¦The plot might have succeeded had not Skeets intervened, allowing Carter to save the day and get official Presidential approval. Ronnie even got to name the new heroâ€¦

Back in 1986 the long-building final clash with the Director began in #10 with ‘Death Grip of the 1000’ when Dirk’s daughter was kidnapped and he was coerced into betraying Booster, just as the nefarious super-mob unleashed a horde of robotic terrors on Metropolis to wear out the Man of Gold and assess his weaknessesâ€¦

After Trixie was also abducted in ‘When Glass Houses Shatter’ the 1000 increased the pressure by setting blockbusting thug Shockwave on Booster, resulting in the utter destruction of the hero’s corporate headquarters and home before a frenzied and frenetic final clash in ‘War’â€¦

With the threat of the 1000 ended ‘The Tomorrow Run’ (inked by Gary Martin) found Booster at death’s door, not because of his numerous injuries but because his 25^th century body had succumbed to 20^th century diseases. Set during the Legends publishing event, which saw the public turn violently against costumed heroes, the dying Carter was rescued from a mob by Trixie wearing Jack Soo’s completed super-suit after which the cast resolve to take Michael back to the future where he can be properly treated, even though Booster’s offences carried a mandatory death penalty in his home eraâ€¦

Recruiting young Rip Hunter (destined to become the Master of Time) Trixie and Dr. Soo accompanied the distressed hero to a time where ruthless Darwinian capitalism ruled and everything Michael Carter once dreamed of had turned to bitter ashesâ€¦

‘A Future Lost’ (inked by DeCarlo) followed Booster and Trixie as they searched for a cure (and his missing twin sister Michelle) whilst Hunter and Soo attempted to find a way to return them all to 1986.

Booster’s illness was only cured after they were arrested: the authorities believing it barbaric to execute anybody too sick to stand up, before ‘Runback’ (inked by Bruce D. Patterson) concluded the saga in fine style with the missing Carter twin saving the day and retreating to the 20^th century with the time-lost travellers.

Booster Gold’s close call had a salutary effect on his attitudes and character. ‘Fresh Start’ (inked by Bob Lewis) saw a kinder, gentler corporate entrepreneur begin to re-establish his heroic credentials with the celebrity-crazed public of Metropolis, to the extent that Maxwell Lord even offered him membership in the newly re-formed Justice League, just as sultry assassin Cheshire began raiding a biotech company recently acquired by Booster Gold Internationalâ€¦

‘Dream of Terror’ (inked by Arne Starr) revealed all as new owner Booster discovered that his latest corporate asset had been making bio-toxins designed to eradicate all â€œundeservingâ€ individuals (for which read non-white and poor) and that its creator was currently loose in Mexico City with the lethal bug. Moreover, the deranged biochemist had bamboozled militant hero the Hawk into acting as bodyguard while his plans to â€œsave humanity from itselfâ€ took effectâ€¦

Decarlo returned to ink ‘Showdown’ in #18, as a relentless lawman from Booster’s home-time tracked him down through history, determined to render final judgement before ‘Revenge of the Rainbow Raider’ (inked by Al Vey) pitted the Man of Gold against the colour-blind and utterly demented Flash villain in a two-part revenge thriller that saw our hero rendered sightless and his future shocked sister go native amongst the 20^th century primitives.

The tale concluded with ‘The Colors of Justice’ as Dr. Soo came to Booster’s rescue whilst Michelle was being kidnapped by extra-dimensional invadersâ€¦

Up until this moment the art in this volume, whilst always competent, had been suffering an annoying hindrance, designed as it was for high quality, full-colour comicbooks, not stark, black and white reproduction. Although legible, discernable and adequate, much of the earlier art is fine-lined, lacking contrasting dark areas and often giving the impression that the illustrations lack solidity and definition.

With Booster Gold #21 the marvellous Ty Templeton became regular inker and his bold, luscious brush-strokes brought a reassuring firmness and texture to the proceedings. As if to affirm the artistic redirection the stories became a tad darker tooâ€¦

‘Invasion From Dimension X’ has Booster’s search for his missing sister impinge on a covert intrusion by belligerent aliens first encountered and defeated by the Teen Titans (see Showcase Presents Teen Titans volume 2). To make matters worse the extra-dimensionals are using Michelle as a power-source to fuel their invasion, resulting in ‘Tortured Options’ for Booster who had to decide between saving Michelle or the city of Minneapolis when the invaders opened their assault with a colossal monster attackâ€¦

Guest-starring Justice League International, the astounding battle climaxed in public triumph and personal tragedy after which the heart-broken, embittered Booster seemingly attacked Superman in ‘All That Glisters’ (Action Comics #594, November 1987, by John Byrne & Keith Williams); a terse, brutal confrontation that concluded in Booster Gold #23 and ‘Blind Obsession’ (Jurgens & Roy Richardson) as the real Man of Gold crushed a Kryptonite-powered facsimile android designed by the world’s most unscrupulous businessman to kill Superman and frame his closest commercial rivalâ€¦

If only they had known that at that very moment Booster Gold International was being bankrupted by a traitor at the heart of the companyâ€¦

After Crisis on Infinite Earths and Legends, DC’s third company-wide crossover Millennium saw Steve Englehart describe how robotic peacekeepers called Manhunters had infiltrated Earth to abort the next stage in human evolution. Built by the Guardians of the Universe billions of years ago, the automated peacekeepers had rebelled against their creators and now planned to thwart their makers’ latest project, destroying or suborning Earth’s costumed defenders in the process.

In its original form each weekly instalment of Millennium acted as a catalyst for events which played out in the rest of the DC Universe’s comics. In addition to the miniseries itself, Millennium spread across 21 titles for two months – another 37 issues – for a grand total of 44 comic-books. Issues #24 and 25 of Booster Gold were two of them.

‘Betrayal’ revealed that one of Michael Carter’s inner circle had been a Manhunter agent all along and had bankrupted the hero at the most propitious moment simply so that the robots could buy his loyalty during their assault on humanityâ€¦

The series came to a shocking climax in ‘The End’ as the scheme worked and Booster actually switched sidesâ€¦ or did he?

After the surprisingly satisfying and upbeat denouement Booster became a perennial star of Justice League International where, with fellow homeless hero Blue Beetle, he became half of the one of funniest double-acts in comics. As â€œBlue and Goldâ€ the hapless, cash-strapped odd couple were always at the heart of the action – pecuniary or otherwise – and the final tale here ‘From the Depths’ (by Jurgens & Tim Dzon, originally presented in Secret Origins #35, December 1988) reprised the early tragic days of Michael Jon Carter in a brief and exceedingly impressive tale played as much to tug the heartstrings as tickle the funny-boneâ€¦

As a frontrunner of the new DC, Booster Gold was a radical experiment in character that didn’t always succeed, but which definitely and exponentially improved as the months rolled by. The early episodes are a necessary chore but by the time the volume ends it’s a real shame that the now thoroughly entertaining and enjoyable ride is over. Perhaps not to every Fights ‘n’ Tights fan’s taste; these formative fictions are absolutely vital to your understanding of the later classics. Cheap and fun this book is worth the investment simply because of what follows in such comics gems as Justice League International volume 1 and 2 and Booster Gold: Blue and Gold.

May 23, 2011May 21, 2011

Showcase Presents the Unknown Soldier volume 1

By Joe Kubert, Bob Haney, Archie Goodwin & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-1090-2

After the death of EC Comics in the mid-1950’s and prior to the game-changing Blazing Combat, the only certain place to find powerful, controversial, challenging and entertaining American war comics was DC. In fact, even whilst Archie Goodwin’s stunning but tragically mis-marketed quartet of classics were waking up a generation, the home of Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman was a veritable cornucopia of gritty, intriguing and beautifully illustrated battle tales presenting war on a variety of fronts and from many differing points of view .

After the Vietnam War escalated, 1960’s America entered a homefront death-struggle pitting deeply-ingrained establishment social attitudes against a youth-oriented generation with a radical new sensibility. In response DC’s (or rather National Periodical Publishing, as it then was) war books became even more bold and innovativeâ€¦

This stunning black and white compendium, collecting the lead feature from issues #151-188 (June-July 1970 to June 1975) of the truly venerable Star-Spangled War Stories anthology features one of the very best concepts ever devised for a war comic: a faceless, nameless hero perpetually in the right place at the right time, ready, willing and oh, so able to turn the tideâ€¦

The Unknown Soldier was actually a spin-off – having first appeared as a one-off in a Sgt Rock story in Our Army at War #168 (June 1966, by Robert Kanigher & Joe Kubert) – but in 1970 the artist had become editor of the company’s war division and was looking for a new (American) cover/lead character to follow the critically acclaimed â€œEnemy Aceâ€ (tales of a WWI German fighter pilot) who had been summarily bounced to the back of the book after issue #150).

Written and drawn by Kubert ‘They Came Back From Shangri-La!’ introduced a faceless super-spy and master-of-disguise whose forebears had fought and died in every American conflict since the birth of the nation. Here he took on the identity of B-25 pilot Capt. Shales in 1942 as he participated in vital, morale-building retaliatory bombing raids on Japanese cities. When their plane is shot down over occupied China, â€œShalesâ€ led his crew through enemy-infested territory to the safety of the Chinese resistance.

From this no-nonsense start the feature grew to be one of DC’s most popular and long-lived: Star-Spangled became The Unknown Soldier in 1977 with #205 and the comic only folded in 1982 with issue #268.

One intriguing factor in the tales is that there is very little internal chronology: the individual adventures take place anytime and anywhere between the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the surrender of Germany and later Japan. This picaresque approach adds a powerful sense of both timelessness and infallible, unflinching continuity.

The Unknown Soldier has always and will always be where he is most neededâ€¦

His second adventure ‘Instant Glory!’ found a US patrol captured by the SS as they entered a German city in 1944. An excoriating examination of brutality, heroism and philosophy, the story set the hard-bitten, bitter-edged tone for the rest of the series.

Always economy-conscious and clever with scissors and glue, DC reformatted a number of old stories at this time, particularly old westerns and mystery stories (and even the Phantom Stranger in his first appearances since the 1950s) so it should be no surprise that they would try the same thing with their newest star.

‘Everybody Dies’ was retooled into a new offering by a framing sequence by Kubert, but the body of the tale was originally seen as ‘A GI Passed Here’ (by Irv Novick in Star-Spangled War Stories #36). In its revamped form the saga recounted a grim day in the life of anonymous Eddie Gray as he survived just one more day in the deserts of Nazi-held Africa.

The Unknown Soldier got a full origin in #154’s ‘I’ll Never Die!’ recounting how two inseparable brothers joined up in the days before America was attacked and were posted to the Philippines just as the Japanese began their seemingly unstoppable Pacific Campaign. Overwhelmed by a tidal wave of enemy soldiers the brothers held their jungle posts to the last and when relief came only one had survived, his face a tattered mess of raw flesh and boneâ€¦

As the US forces retreated from the islands the indomitable survivor was evacuated to a state-side hospital. Refusing medals, honours and retirement the recuperating warrior dedicated his remaining years to his lost brother Harry and desperately retrained as a one man-army intelligence unit. His unsalvageable face swathed in bandages, the nameless fighter learned the arts of make-up, disguise and mimicry and offered himself to the State Department as an expendable resource that could go anywhere and do anythingâ€¦

All DC’s titles were actively tackling the issue of race at this time and #155’s ‘Invasion Game!’ (written by Bob Haney) saw the Soldier parachuted into France in Spring 1944 to connect with the Underground’s mysterious leader â€œChat Noirâ€. Sent to finalise the plans for D-Day he was horrified to discover the enigmatic commander was a disgraced black US Army sergeant with a grudge against his old country. Chat Noir was too good a character to waste and became a semi-regular cast memberâ€¦

Haney was on top form for the next epic too. ‘Assassination’ detailed the Immortal G.I.’s boldest mission and greatest failure as he impersonated but could not destroy Hitler himself, after which that aforementioned Sgt Rock classic by Kanigher & Kubert was recycled as an untitled but deeply moving yarn for Star-Spangled War Stories #157.

Haney & Kubert reunited for ‘Totentanz!’ as the faceless warrior broke into a top security concentration camp to rescue a captured resistance leader.

General Patton was the thinly-veiled subject of ‘Man of War’ as the Unknown Soldier was dispatched to investigate a charismatic general who had pushed his own troops to the brink of mutiny, whilst ‘Blood is the Code!’ found him captured and tortured by a Japanese Colonel until he broke to reveal every secret America wanted the enemy to knowâ€¦

Doug Wildey illustrated Haney’s superb ‘The Long Jump’ as the Soldier infiltrated occupied Holland only to meet more resistance from a stubborn, misguided Dutchman than all the Nazis hunting for the faceless spy, ‘Take My Coward’s Hand’ recycled the 1960 Sgt. Rock story ‘No Answer from Sarge’ (by Kanigher & Kubert from Our Army at War #91) and ‘Kill the General!’ by Haney & Dan Spiegle pitted the Man of a Thousand Faces against Nazi infiltrators determined to assassinate General Eisenhower at the height of the Battle of the Bulge.

‘Remittance Man!’ in #164 saw the anonymous hero replace a legendary spotter on an occupied Pacific island, directing Allied attacks on Japanese strongholds, after which Jack Sparling came aboard as artist in ‘Witness For a Coward’ as a US tank commander sentenced to death for desertion is saved by the testimony of a Nazi Officer – but only after he was abducted from his HQ by the immortal G.I. after which a debt of honour had to be repaidâ€¦

Bill Mauldin’s legendary wartime dogfaces â€œWillie and Joeâ€ (see the superb Up Front for further details) paid an unannounced visit in #166 ‘The True Glory’ as the Unknown Soldier travelled to Italy to find out what was holding up the advance in Haney’s last offering, after which Archie Goodwin steps in to script ‘Three Targets for the Viper!’ wherein the faceless man hunted an assassin set on killing Churchill, Roosevelt and De Gaulle during a conference in 1943 Morocco before jumping to France in 1944 and a close encounter with an American officer determined to make a name for himself at any cost in ‘The Glory Hound!’

Godwin’s tenure saw a stronger concentration on espionage drama, as with issue #169 which found the Immortal G.I. infiltrating the compound where Hitler’s latest secret weapon was being built in ‘Destroy the Devil’s Broomstick!’ after which the Soldier had to stand in for an irreplaceable Marine Major and capture an impregnable island fortress in ‘Legends Don’t Die!’

‘Appointment in Prague!’ offered a rare and tragic glimpse into the Unknown Soldier’s past as he followed the aged actor who taught him the mastery of make-up and impersonation into Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia to rescue a grandson thought long dead, after which scripter Frank Robbins took over and moved the action to the Eastern Front in ‘A Cocktail For Molotov!’ where the Nazis pulled out all the stops to destroy Russia’s charismatic foreign Minister before he could conclude a treaty with the Allies.

Star-Spangled War Stories #173 saw the G.I. infiltrating a Japanese Submarine base disguised as a Nazi wrestler invited to an exhibition match against a Sumo master. Unfortunately ‘No Holds Barred!’ proved that although allies, Japanese and Germans weren’t exactly friendsâ€¦

‘Operation Snafu!’ began an extended storyline as it found him impersonating a German tank-commander and forced to sacrifice his own Resistance allies in order to complete a mission vital to the Allied advance, whilst ‘A Slow Burnâ€¦ From Both Ends!’ gave him the chance to make amends and #176’s ‘Target: the Unknown Soldier!’ ramped up the tension as the Nazis discovered a way to identify the faceless warrior no matter how he was disguisedâ€¦

With Von Sturm, his deadly Nazi counterpart, on his trail, the Unknown Soldier had stirred up ‘The Hornet’s Nest!’ and was hunted and hounded towards a concentration camp where inmates work as slaves to construct V1 rockets. Trapped, with the net closing around him, he replaced one of the jailers but Von Sturm was determined to deliver ‘The Sting of Death!’ in the spectacular climactic duel to the deathâ€¦

In Star-Spangled War Stories #179 in the aftermath of his close escape the Immortal G.I. stumbled into ‘A Town Called Hate!’ where racial tensions between white and black American soldiers had devolved into tit-for-tat murders. Unfortunately, whilst disguised as a member of an SS infiltration squad, the Soldier could only exacerbate the situation. With the Germans about to deliver a devastating counter-attack it was a good thing the long-missing Chat Noir was also on handâ€¦

‘The Doomsday Heroes!’ despatched the anonymous agent to the Leyte Gulf where Japanese suicide attacks had stopped the US advance. However before he could begin his mission he was shot down and forced to work with a failed Kamikaze pilot to survive the cruel Pacific seasâ€¦

After that tragedy of honour the mission continued with ‘One Guy in the Right Placeâ€¦’ as the Soldier linked up with natives fighting the Japanese invaders. Disturbingly they are led by an unseen American who sounded like the brother he had lost in the first days of the war. Could Harry have survived all those yearsâ€¦?

Robbins and Sparling bowed out with a classy mini-classic in Star-Spangled War Stories #182, set in Tunisia where ‘A Thirst for Death!’ set the Soldier and a crew of veterans on the sandy trail of Rommel’s hidden petrol reserves, after which new kids David Michelinie & Gerry Talaoc heralded a change of direction with ‘8,000 to One’.

The horror boom in comics was at its peak in 1974 and new editor Joe Orlando capitalised on that fascination with a few startling changes – the most controversial being to regularly reveal the Unknown Soldier’s grotesque, scar-ravaged face – presumably to draw in monster-hungry fear fansâ€¦

The story itself went back to the Immortal G.I.’s earliest days as an American agent and saw him sent to Denmark to rescue a ship full of Danish Jews destined for Hitler’s death camps. Disguised as SS Captain Max Shreik, the Soldier was forced to make an unconscionable choice to safeguard his mission. The degree and manner of graphic violence was also exponentially increased to accommodate the more mature readership as the Soldier took a very personal revenge…

‘A Sense of Obligation’ found the now cold, remorseless warrior in France tasked with infiltrating a Special Kommando Training Centre and destroying it from within. However, as with all undercover work, the risk of going too deep and making friends who you might have to kill later inevitably led to another tragic life or death decision for the increasingly grim and soulless Soldier, whilst ‘The Hero’ saw the faceless man invade neutral Switzerland to kidnap a British scientist held by the Nazis. This time his lethal final judgement cost him no sleep at allâ€¦

In ‘Man of Godâ€¦ Man of War’ (#186) a Catholic Priest duped into working with the Nazis in Italy became the Soldier’s latest target, but the plan was forestalled and the true situation revealed and rectified after ‘A Death in the Chapel’.

This imposing, impressive and thoroughly entertaining first volume concludes with Star-Spangled War Stories #188 and ‘Encounter’ as the Unknown Soldier strove to prevent the scuttling of a hospital ship by Nazis, unaware that his only ally was in love with the enemy commanderâ€¦

Dark, powerful, moving and overwhelmingly ingenious, The Unknown Soldier is a magnificent addition to the ranks of extraordinary mortal warriors in an industry far too heavy with implausible and incredible heroes. These tales will appeal to not just comics readers but all fans of action fiction.
Â© 1970, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1974, 1975, 2006 DC Comics. All rights reserved.

May 16, 2011May 15, 2011

Showcase Presents Dial H For Hero

By Dave Wood, Jim Mooney & various (DC Comics)
ISBN13: 978-1-4012-2648-0

The entire world was going crazy for costumed crusaders in the mid-Sixties and every comicbook publisher was keenly seeking new ways to repackage an extremely exciting yet intrinsically limited concept. Perhaps its ultimate expression came with the creation of a teen-aged everyman champion who battled crime and disaster in his little town with the aid on a fantastic wonder-toolâ€¦

This slim monochrome compendium collects the entire run from House of Mystery #156 (January 1966) to #173 (March-April 1968) when the comicbook disappeared for a few months to re-emerge as DC’s first – of many – anthological supernatural mystery titles.

Created by Dave Wood and Jim Mooney, Dial H For Hero recounted the incredible adventures of boy genius Robby Reed who lived with his grandfather in idyllic Littleville where nothing ever happenedâ€¦

Criminally, very little is known about writer Dave Wood, whose prolific output began in the early days of the American comics industry and whose work includes such seminal classics (often with artistic legends Jack Kirby and Wally no-relation Wood) as Challengers of the Unknown and the seminal â€œSpace Raceâ€ newspaper strip Sky Masters.

A skilled â€œjobbingâ€ writer, Wood often collaborated with his brother Dick, bouncing around the industry, scripting mystery, war, science fiction and adventure tales. Among his/their vast credits are stints on most Superman family titles, Batman, Detective Comics, World’s Finest, Green Arrow, Rex the Wonder Dog, Tomahawk, Blackhawk, Martian Manhunter and many others. As well as Dial H For Hero Wood created the sleeper hit Animal Man and the esoteric but fondly regarded Ultra, the Multi-Alien.

James Noel Mooney started his comics career in 1940, aged 21 and working for the Eisner & Eiger production shop and Fiction House on The Moth, Camilla, Suicide Smith and other B-features. By the end of the year he was a mainstay of Timely Comic’s vast funny animal/animated cartoon tie-in department.

In 1946 Jim moved to DC to ghost Batman for Bob Kane and Dick Sprang. He stayed until 1968, working on a host of features including Superman, Superboy, Legion of Super-Heroes, World’s Finest and Tommy Tomorrow, plus various genre short stories for the company’s assorted anthology titles like Tales of the Unexpected and House of Mystery.

He also drew Supergirl from her series debut in Action Comics #253 to #373, after which he headed for Marvel and stellar runs on Spider-Man, Marvel Team-up, Omega the Unknown, Man-Thing, Ghost Rider and a host of other features as both penciller and inker. Just before that move he was working on Dial H For Hero; the only original DC feature he co-created.

Big things were clearly expected of the new feature, which was parachuted in as lead and cover feature, demoting the venerable Martian Manhunter to a back-up role at the end of each issue.

The first untitled story opens with an attack on the local chemical works by super-scientific criminal organisation Thunderbolt just as Robby and his pals were playing in the hills above the site. As they fled the plucky lad was caught in a landslide and fell into an ancient cave where lay an obviously alien artefact that looked like an outlandish telephone dial.

After finding his way out of the cavern Robby became obsessed with the device and spent all his time attempting to translate the arcane hieroglyphs on it. Eventually he determined the writings were instructions to dial the symbols which translate to â€œHâ€, â€œEâ€, â€œRâ€ and â€œOâ€â€¦

Ever curious Robby complied and was transformed into a colossal super-powered â€œGiantboyâ€, just in time to save a crashing airliner and stop another Thunderbolt raid. Returning home he reversed the dialling process and went to bedâ€¦

These were and still are perfect wish-fulfilment stories: uncluttered and uncomplicated yarns hiding no great messages or themes: just straight entertainment expertly undertaken by experienced and gifted craftsmen who knew just how to reach their young-at-heart audiences, so no-one should be surprised at the ease with which Robby adapted to his new situationâ€¦

When Thunderbolt struck again next morning Robby grabbed his dial but was startled to become a different hero – high-energy being â€œThe Cometeerâ€. Streaking to the rescue he was overcome by the raider’s super weapon and forced to use the dial to become Robby again. Undeterred, the lad tries again and as â€œThe Moleâ€ finally tracked the villains to their base and defeated them – although the leader escaped to become the series’ only returning villainâ€¦

Mr. Thunder was back in the very next issue as Robby became â€œThe Human, Bulletâ€, bestial energy-being â€œSuper-Chargeâ€ and eerie alien â€œRadar-Sonar Manâ€ to crush ‘The Marauders from Thunderbolt Island’ whilst criminal scientist Daffy Dagan stole the H-Dial after defeating the boy’s temporary alter ego â€œQuake-Masterâ€. Dagan became a horrifying multi-powered monster when he learned to ‘Dial â€œVâ€ For Villain’ but after the defeated hero took back the artefact Robby redialed into techno-warrior â€œThe Squidâ€ and belatedly saved the day.

Clearly the Mystery in House ofâ€¦ was related to where the Dial came from, what its unknown parameters were and who Robby would transform into next. Issue #159 pitted â€œThe Human Starfishâ€, â€œHypno-Manâ€ and a super-powered toddler named â€œMighty Moppetâ€ (who wielded weaponised baby bottles) in single combats with a shape-changing gang of bandits dubbed ‘The Clay-Creep Clan’ whilst ‘The Wizard of Light’ played with the format a little by introducing a potential love-interest for Robby in his best friend’s cousin Suzyâ€¦

It also saw the return of Giant-Boy, the introduction of sugar-based sentinel of Justice â€œKing Candyâ€ and the lad’s only transformation into an already established hero – the Golden Age legend Plastic Man.

Cynical me now suspects the move was a tester to see if the Pliable Paladin – who had been an inert resource since the company had bought out original publisher Quality Comics in 1956 – was ripe for a relaunch in the new, superhero-hungry environment.

DC’s Plastic Man #1 was released five months laterâ€¦

House of Mystery #161 featured an awesome ancient Egyptian menace ‘The Mummy with Six Heads’ who proved too much for Robby as â€œMagnetoâ€ (same powers but so very not a certain Marvel villain) and â€œHornet-Manâ€ but not the intangible avenger â€œShadow-Manâ€, after which ‘The Monster-Maker of Littleville’ was proved by â€œMr. Echoâ€ and â€œFuture-Manâ€ to be less mad scientist than greedy entrepreneurâ€¦

‘Baron Bug and his Insect Army’ almost ended Robby’s clandestine career when the boy turned into two heroes at once; but even though the celestial twins â€œCastor and Polluxâ€ were overmatched, animated slinky-toy â€œKing Coilâ€ proved sufficient to stamp out the Baron’s giant mini-beasts, whilst human wave â€œZip Tideâ€, living star â€œSuper Novaâ€ and â€œRobby the Super-Robotâ€ were hard-pressed to stop the rampages of ‘Dr. Cyclops – the Villain with the Doomsday Stare’.

Things got decidedly peculiar in #165 when a clearly malfunctioning H-Dial called up ‘The Freak Super-Heroes’ â€œWhoozisâ€, â€œWhatsisâ€ and â€œHowzisâ€ to battle Dr. Rigoro Mortis and his artificial thug Super-Hood in a bizarrely captivating romp with what looks like some unacknowledged inking assistance from veteran brush-meister George Roussos (who popped in a couple more times until Mooney’s departure).

Suzie became a fixture and moved into the house next door with ‘The King of the Curses’ who found his schemes to plunder the city thwarted by â€œTheYankee-Doodle Kidâ€ and â€œChief Mighty Arrowâ€, a war-bonneted Indian brave on a winged horseâ€¦

In HoM #167 ‘The Fantastic Rainbow Raider’ easily defeated â€œBalloon Boyâ€ and â€œMuscle Manâ€ but had no defence against the returning Radar-Sonar Man, whilst ‘The Marauding Moon Man’ easily overmatched Robby as â€œThe Hoopsterâ€ but had no defence when another glitch turned old incarnations Mole and Cometeer into a single heroic composite imaginatively christened â€œMole-Cometeerâ€, but the biggest shock of all came when ‘The Terrible Toymaster’ defeated Robby as â€œVelocity Kidâ€ and Suzy cajoled the fallen hero into dialling her into the scintillating â€œGem Girlâ€ to finish the job.

As it was the 1960s, Suzy didn’t quite manage on her own, but when Robby transformed into the psionically-potent â€œAstro, Man of Spaceâ€ they soon closed the case – and toybox – for good. This one was all Mooney and so was the next.

‘Thunderbolt’s Secret Weapon’ was also the artist’s last outing with the Kid of a Thousand Capes as the incorrigible cartel tried to steal a supercomputer only to be stopped dead by â€œBaron Buzz-Sawâ€, â€œDon Juanâ€ (and his magic sword) and the imposing â€œSphinx-Manâ€.

With House of Mystery #171 a radical new look emerged, as well as slightly darker tone. The writing was clearly on the wall for the exuberant, angst-free adventurerâ€¦

‘The Micro-Monsters!’ was illustrated by Frank Springer and saw Robby dial up â€œKing Viking – Super Norsemanâ€, â€œGo-Goâ€ a hipster who utilised the incredible powers of popular disco dances (how long have I waited to type that line!!!?) and multi-powered â€œWhirl-I-Gigâ€ to defeat bio-terrorist Doc Morhar and belligerent invaders from a sub-atomic dimension.

Springer also drew ‘The Monsters from the H-Dial’ wherein the again on-the-fritz gear turned his friend Jim into various ravening horrors every time Robby dialled up. Luckily the unnamed animated pendulum, Chief Mighty Arrow and â€œthe Human Solar Mirrorâ€ our hero successively turned into proved just enough to stop the beasts until the canny boy could apply his trusty screwdriver to the incredible artefact again.

In those distant days series ended abruptly, without fanfare and often in the middle of somethingâ€¦ and such was the fate of Robby Reed. HoM#173, by Wood and Sal Trapani saw the lad solve a mystery in ‘The Revolt of the H-Dial’ wherein the process turned him into water-breathing â€œGill-Manâ€ and a literal â€œIcicle Manâ€: beings not only unsuitable for life on Earth but also compelled to commit crimes. Luckily by the time Robby had become â€œStrata Manâ€ he’d deduced what outside force was affecting his dangerously double-edged dialâ€¦

And that was that. The series was gone, the market was again abandoning the fights ‘n’ Tights crowd and on the horizon was a host of war western, barbarian and horror comicsâ€¦

Exciting, fun, engaging and silly in equal amounts (heck, even I couldn’t resist a jibe or too and I genuinely revere these daft, nostalgia-soaked gems) Dial H For Hero has been re-imagined a number of time since these innocent odysseys first ran, but never with the clear-cut, unsophisticated, welcoming charm displayed here.

This is Ben-10 for your dad’s generation and your kid’s delectation: and only if they’re at just that certain age. Certainly you’re too grown up to enjoy these glorious classics. Surely you couldn’t be that lucky; could youâ€¦?

May 12, 2011May 10, 2011

Showcase Presents Blackhawk volume 1

By anonymous, Dick Dillin & Chuck Cuidera (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-1983-3

The early days of the American comicbook industry were awash with both opportunity and talent and these factors also coincided with a vast population hungry for cheap entertainment. Comics had no acknowledged fans or collectors; only a large, transient market-place open to all varied aspects of yarn-spinning and tale-telling – a situation which maintained right up to the middle of the 1960s.

Thus, even though loudly isolationist and more than six months away from active inclusion in World War II, creators like Will Eisner and publishers like Everett M. (â€œBusyâ€) Arnold felt that Americans were ready for the themed anthology title Military Comics.

Nobody was ready for Blackhawk.

Military Comics #1 launched on May 30th 1941 (with an August cover-date) and included in its gritty, two-fisted line-up Death Patrol by Jack Cole, Miss America, Fred Guardineer’s Blue Tracer, X of the Underground, the Yankee Eagle, Q-Boat, Shot and Shell, Archie Atkins and Loops and Banks by â€œBud Ernestâ€ (actually aviation-nut and unsung comics genius Bob Powell), but none of the strips, not even Cole’s surreal and suicidal team of hell-bent fliers, had the instant cachet and sheer appeal of Eisner and Powell’s â€œForeign Legion of the Airâ€ led by the charismatic Dark Knight of the airways known only as Blackhawk.

Chuck Cuidera, already famed for creating the original Blue Beetle for Fox, drew ‘the Origin of Blackhawk’ for the first issue, wherein a lone pilot fighting the Nazi invasion of Poland in 1939 was shot down by Nazi Ace Von Tepp; only to rise bloody and unbowed from his plane’s wreckage to form the World’s greatest team of airborne fighting menâ€¦

This mysterious paramilitary squadron of unbeatable fliers, dedicated to crushing injustice and smashing the Axis war-machine, battled on all fronts during the war and stayed together to crush international crime, Communism and every threat to democracy from alien invaders to supernatural monsters, becoming one of the true milestones of the US industry. Eisner wrote the first four Blackhawk episodes before moving on and Cuidera stayed until issue #11 – although he triumphantly returned in later years.

There were many melodramatic touches that made the Blackhawks so memorable in the eyes of a wide-eyed populace of thrill-hungry kids. There was the cool, black leather uniforms and peaked caps. The unique, outrageous – but authentic – Grumman F5F-1 Skyrocket planes they flew from their secret island base and of course their eerie battle-cry â€œHawkaaaaa!â€

But perhaps the oddest idiosyncrasy to modern readers was that they had their own song (would you be more comfortable if we started calling it an international anthem?) which Blackhawk, AndrÃ©, Stanislaus, Olaf, Chuck, Hendrickson and Chop-Chop would sing as they plummeted into battle (to see the music and lyrics check out the Blackhawk Archives edition); just remember this number was written for seven really tough leather-clad guys to sing while dodging bulletsâ€¦

Quality adapted well to peacetime demands: Plastic Man and Doll Man lasted far longer than most Golden Age superhero titles, whilst the rest of the line adapted into tough-guy crime, war, western, horror and racy comedy titles. The Blackhawks soared to even greater heights, starring in their own movie serial in 1952. However the hostility of the marketplace to mature-targeted titles after the adoption of the self-censorious Comics Code was a clear sign of the times; as 1956 ended Arnold sold most of his comics properties and titles to National Publishing Periodicals (now DC) and set up as a general magazine publisher.

Many of the purchases were a huge boost to National’s portfolio, with titles such as GI Combat, Heart Throbs and Blackhawk lasting uninterrupted well into the 1970s (GI Combat survived until in 1987), whilst the unceasing draw and potential of characters such as Uncle Sam, the assorted Freedom Fighters costumed pantheon, Kid Eternity and Plastic Man have paid dividends ever since.

This commodious monochrome collection covers the first National-emblazoned issue (#108, January 1957) through #127 (August 1958) which saw the Air Aces hit the ground running in a monthly title (at a time when Superman and Batman were only published eight times a year) and almost instantly established themselves as a valuable draw in the DC firmament.

Regrettably many of the records are lost so scripter-credits are not available (potential candidates include Ed â€œFranceâ€ Herron, Arnold Drake, George Kashdan, Jack Miller, Bill Woolfolk, Jack Schiff and/or Dave Wood) but the art remained in the capable hands of veteran illustrators Dick Dillin and Chuck Cuidera: a team who meshed so seamlessly that they often traded roles with few any the wiserâ€¦

Moreover although broadly formulaic the gritty cachet, crime and Sci Fi underpinnings and international jurisdiction of the team always allowed great internal variety within the tales, so with three complete adventures per issue, this terrific tome is a joyous celebration and compelling reminder of simpler yet more intriguing times.

The action begins with ‘The Threat From the Abyss’ an old-school â€œCommie-Stomperâ€ yarn wherein the Magnificent Seven put paid to a sinister subsea Soviet rocket base, after which ‘Killer Shark’s Secret Weapon’ stuck with the watery theme as the Blackhawks’ greatest foe returned with another outrageous mechanical masterpiece to aid his piratical schemes. Issue #108 concludes with ‘The Mutiny of the Red Sailors’ wherein a mass-defection of Russian mariners in Hong Kong proved to be a cunning scheme to destroy the British Colony.

‘The Avalanche King’ detailed the struggle against Red infiltrators in South America, ‘Blackhawk the Sorcerer!’ saw the team discover a lost outpost of Norman knights who had missed the invasion of England in 1066 and ‘The Raid on Blackhawk Island’ pitted the squad against their own trophies as an intruder invaded their secret base and turned a host of captured super-weapons against them.

Blackhawk #110 opened with ‘The Mystery of Tigress Island’ as the doughty lads battled an all-girl team of rival international aviators, ‘The Prophet of Disaster’ proved to be not a seer but simply a middle Eastern conman and ‘Duel of Giants’ pitted the team against a deranged scientist who could enlarge his body to blockbuster proportions.

‘The Menace of the Machines’ found the heroes battling the incredible gimmicks of a Hollywood special effects wizard who had turned to crime, ‘The Perils of Blackie, the Wonder Bird’ featured the team’s incredible feathered mascot who cunningly turned the tables on the spy-ring which had captured him whilst ‘Trigger Craig’s Magic Carpet’ proved once again that Crime Does Not Pay but also that even ancient sorcery was no match for bold hearts and heavy machine-gunsâ€¦

‘The Doomed Dogfight’ opened #112 as a Nazi ace schemed to rerun his WWII aerial duel against Blackhawk; criminal counterpart squadron ‘The Crimson Vultures’ proved to be no match for the Dark Knights and ‘The Eighth Blackhawk’ was nothing more than a dirty traitorâ€¦ or was he?

‘The Volunteers of Doom’ found the team uncovering sabotage whilst testing dangerous super-weapons for the US Government and ‘The Saboteur of Blackhawk Island’ only appeared to be one of the valiant crew before ‘The Cellblock in the Sky’ found the heroes imprisoned by a disenchanted genius in floating cages – but not for longâ€¦

‘The Gladiators of Blackhawk Island’ saw a training exercise co-opted by criminals with deadly consequences whilst costumed criminal the Mole almost enslaved ‘20,000 Leagues Beneath the Earth’ and Blackie was transformed into a ravening and uncontrollable menace in ‘The Winged Goliath’.

In ‘The Tyrant’s Return’ a group of Nazi war criminals rallied sympathisers around a new Hitler, ‘Blackie Goes Wild’ saw the gifted raptorÂ revert to savagery but still thwart a South American revolution whilst ‘The Creature of Blackhawk Island’ saw a extra-dimensional monster foolishly begin smashing through to our reality on the most heavily fortified military base on Earthâ€¦

As ‘The Prisoners of the Black Palace’ the old comrades crushed a criminal scheme to quartermaster the entire international underworld, Blackhawk became ‘The Human Torpedo’ to eradicate a sea-going gangster but ended up in contention with a race of mermen, and old Hendrickson became ‘The Outcast Blackhawk’ after failing his annual requalification examsâ€¦

Blackhawk #117 began with the team tackling what seemed to be a lost tribe of Vikings in ‘The Menace of the Dragon Boat’ before becoming the targets of a ruthless mastermind in ‘The Seven Little Blackhawks’ and battling a chilling criminal maniac in ‘The Fantastic Mr. Freeze’.

‘The Bandit with 1,000 Nets’ proved to be yet another audacious thief with a novel gimmick whereas the Pacific Ocean was the real enemy when an accident marooned ‘The Blackhawk Robinson Crusoes’ as they hunted the nefarious Sting Ray, before ‘The Human Clay Pigeons’ found the team helpless targets of international assassin and spymaster the Sniper.

A time-travel accident propelled the aviators back to the old West in ‘Blackhawk vs Chief Black Hawk’ and on their return Frenchman Andre inherited a fortune and became ‘The Playboy Blackhawk’ before being kicked off the team. However he was happily back for the all-out dinosaur action of ‘The Valley of the Monsters’â€¦

‘The Challenge of the Wizard’ led in #120 as the crew tackled an ingenious stage magician whilst a well-meaning kid made plenty of trouble for them when he elected himself ‘The Junior Blackhawk!’ before the sinister Professor tricked the heroes into re-enacting ‘The Perils of Ulysses’ with deadly robotic monsters.

‘Secret Weapon of the Archer’ pitted the team against a fantastic attention-seeking costumed menace, whilst ‘The Jinxed Blackhawk’ found the team struggling against bad luck, superstition and a cunning criminal before ‘Siege in the Sahara’ saw them imitating Beau Geste whilst rescuing hijacked atomic weapons from bandit chieftain the Tigerâ€¦

‘The Movie that Backfired’ started out as a biopic but developed into a mystery when criminals began making murderous alterations to the script, ‘The Sky Kites’ found the squad battling aerial pirates The Ravens and ‘The Day the Blackhawks Died’ saw the deadly Cobra lay a lethal trap unaware that he was the prey not the predatorâ€¦

Killer Shark returned to unsuccessfully assault ‘The Underseas Gold Fort’, more leftover Nazis resurfaced to solve a ‘Mystery on Top of the World’ that involved the location of the Reich’s stolen gold and Blackhawk became ‘The Human Rocket’ to thwart an alien invasion.

In issue #124, figures from history were robbing at will and even the Blackhawks were implicated but the ‘Thieves With a Thousand Faces’ proved to be far from supernatural whilst ‘The Beauty and the Blackhawks’ saw shy Chuck apparently bamboozled by a sultry siren whilst ‘The Mechanical Spies From Space’ attempted to establish an Earthly beachhead but were soundly defeated by the Magnificent Seven’s unique blend of human heroism and heavy ordnance.

‘The Secrets of the Blackhawk Time Capsule’ proved an irresistible temptation for scientific super-criminal the Schemer whilst ‘The Sunken Island!’ hid a lost Mongol civilisation in the throes of civil war and ‘The Super Blackhawk’ saw an atomic accident transform the group’s leader into a all-powerful metahumanâ€¦ unfortunately it did the same for the Mole and his entire gang tooâ€¦

‘The Secret of the Glass Fort’ revisited the idea as the entire team temporarily received superpowers to battle alien invaders whilst The Prisoner of Zenda provided the plot for ‘Hendrickson, King For a Day’ as the venerable Dutchman doubled for a missing monarch and ‘The Man Who Collected Blackhawks’ quickly learned to regret using his shrinking ray on the toughest crime-fighters in the Worldâ€¦

This stupendous selection climaxes with issue #127: starting with ‘Blackie – the Winged Sky Fighter’ wherein the formidable hawk rescued his human colleagues from an impossible death-trap, after which strongman Olaf took centre-stage as ‘The Show-Off Blackhawk’ when a showbiz career diverted his attention from the most important things in life and the manly monochrome marvels conclude when a criminal infiltrating the squad disguised as American member Chuck seemingly succeeds in killing the legendary leader in man ‘The Ghost of Blackhawk’.

These stories were produced at a pivotal moment in comics history: the last great outpouring of broadly human-scaled action-heroes in a marketplace increasingly filling up with gaudily clad wondermen and superwomen. The iconic blend of weary sophistication and glorious, juvenile bravado where a few good men with wits, firearms and a trusty animal companion could overcome all odds was fading in the light of spectacular scenarios and ubiquitous alien encounters.

For this precious moment though these rousing tales of the miracles that (extra) ordinary guys can accomplish are some of the early Silver Age’s finest moments. Terrific traditional all-ages entertainment and some of the best comics stories of their time, these tales are forgotten gems of their genre and I sincerely hope DC finds the time and money to continue the magic in further collections.

And so will youâ€¦

May 10, 2011May 10, 2011

Showcase Presents Warlord volume 1

By Mike Grell, with Vince Colletta & various (DC Comics)
ISBN13: 978-1-4012-2473-8

During the troubled 1970s the American comics industry suffered one of the worst of its periodic downturns and publishers desperately cast about for other genres to bolster the flagging sales of superhero comics.

By revising their self-imposed industry code of practice (administered by the Comics Code Authority) to allow supernatural and horror comics, the publishers tapped into the global revival of interest in spiritualism and the supernatural, and as a by-product opened their doors to Sword-and-Sorcery as a viable genre, with Roy Thomas and Barry Smith’s adaptation of R. E. Howard’s Conan the Barbarian an early exemplar.

DC launched a host of titles into that budding market but although individually interesting nothing seemed to catch the public’s eye until number #8 of the company’s latest try-out title First Issue Special.

In that issue popular new Legion of Super-Heroes artist Mike Grell launched his pastiche, homage and tribute to Edgar Rice Burroughs’s works (particularly Pellucidar – At the Earth’s Core) which, after a rather shaky start (like Conan, the series was cancelled early in the run but rapidly reinstated) went on to become for a time DC’s most popular title.

Blending swords, sorcery and super-science with spectacular, visceral derring-do, the lost land of Skartaris was a venue expertly designed for adventure: stuffed with warriors, mythical creatures, dinosaurs and scantily-clad hotties. How could it possibly fail?

This first stupendous black and white compendium, gathers 1^st Issue Special #8 (from November 1975) and Warlord #1-28 (January-February 1976 – December 1979) and delivers wild wonder and breathtaking thrills from the outset.

The magic commences with ‘Land of Fear!’ as in 1969, U2 spy-pilot Colonel Travis Morgan is shot down whilst filming a secret Soviet base. The embattled aviator manages to fly his plane over the North Pole before ditching, expecting to land on frozen Tundra or pack-ice the right side of the Iron Curtain.

Instead he finds himself inside the Earth, marooned in a vast, tropical jungle where the sun never sets. The incredible land is populated by creatures from every era of history and many that never made it into the science books. There are also cavemen, savages, lost races, mythical beasts, barbaric kingdoms and fabulous warrior-women.

Plunging head-on into the madness the baffled airman saves an embattled princess from a hungry saurian before both are captured by soldiers. Taken to the city of Thera, Morgan is taught the language by his fellow captive Tara and makes an implacable enemy of the court wizard Deimos. After surviving an assassination attempt the pair escape into the eternal noon of the land beneath the Earth.

Within months Morgan had his own-bimonthly title written, pencilled and inked by Grell. ‘This Savage World’ saw the lost airman and the Princess of Shamballah fall deeply in love, only to be separated by slavers who leave Morgan to die in #2’s ‘Arena of Death.’ After a stint as a galley slave, Morgan, with Nubian warrior Machiste, led an insurrection of Gladiators which became a full-scale revolution, earning him the title of The Warlord in the process.

However, after this issue the series vanished for months until October-November 1976.

Morgan returned in all his gory glory in #3’s ‘War Gods of Skartaris’, leading his army of liberation and hunting for Tara until he stumbled across his downed aircraft – worshipped as a god by lizard-men and stuffed with lots of twentieth century ordnanceâ€¦ Moreover it had crashed into a temple that gave the first clues to the incredible secret of the lost landâ€¦

‘Duel of the Titans’ saw the Warlord’s army lay siege to Thera, where Deimos had seized power and held Tara hostage. The mage’s sorcery was no match for high explosives and inevitably he lost his life to Morgan’s flashing blade.

Warlord #5 saw the reunited lovers heading for Tara’s home city Shamballah, discovering en route ‘The Secret of Skartaris!’ in a lost temple that held millennia-old computer records revealing the entire land to be a lost colony of Atlantis, with much of the magic of the timeless region nothing more than advanced technology. When one such dormant device rocketed Morgan away Tara thought her man was gone foreverâ€¦

‘Home is a Four-Letter Word!’ saw the displaced aviator returned to the surface-world with eight years gone by since his crash; emerging from a lost outpost in the Andes where a multi-national excavation was being conducted in the Incan ruins of Machu Pichu.

However the scientists used Morgan’s dog-tags to contact his CIA superiors and the suspicious spooks assumed he had defected all these years ago: especially since one of the archaeologists was comely soviet researcher Mariah Romanovaâ€¦ When the intransigent spymasters roused a demonic watchdog Morgan’s only chance was to head back to Skartaris with Mariah in towâ€¦

Back in the temple again, the day he spent on Earth had somehow translated into an interminable time within it. Tara was long gone and Morgan elected to follow her to Shamballah. Stopping in the city of Kiro Morgan and Mariah saved the Warlord’s old comrade Machiste from the insidious horror of ‘The Iron Devil’, after which the trio voyaged together: attacked by cyborg vampires from ‘The City in the Sky’ and braving ‘The Lair of the Snowbeast’, wherein Morgan discovered a unique benefactor and a tragically brief kind of loveâ€¦

Warlord #10 saw the opening sally in a long-running saga as the ‘Tower of Fear’ found the trio aiding a maiden in distress and inadvertently restoring the underland’s greatest monster to life. ‘Trilogy’ in #11 features a triptych of vignettes to display conflicting aspects of the Warlord’s complex character, after which ‘The Hunter’ pitted the wandering warriors against a manic, vengeful CIA agent who had followed Morgan to Skartaris and ‘All Men Are Mine’ saw the gravely wounded Warlord battle the very personification of death.

Issue #15 ‘Holocaust’ (inked by Joe Rubinstein) marked the series’ advancement to a monthly schedule and finally reunited Morgan and Tara in Shamballah. The obtuse warrior was stunned to see Mariah heartbroken by the couple’s joy, resulting in hers and Machiste’s incensed departure. The biggest shock, though, was Morgan’s introduction to his son, Joshua. However he didn’t have much time to dwell as the city began to explosively self-destruct. As Morgan and Tara tackled the major crisis Deimos struck, abducting the babyâ€¦

Vince Colletta came aboard as regular inker with the beginning of ‘The Quest’ as Morgan and Tara hunted down the undead sorcerer starting with ‘Visions in a Crimson Eye’, battling Deimos’ minions and rival magicians, encountering the desert-locked ‘Citadel of Death’ (which revealed some intriguing Skartaran history from the Age of the Wizard Kings) before being briefly distracted by alien invaders in ‘Bloodmoon’.

Scouring Skartaris, Tara and Morgan were reunited with Mariah and Machiste in ‘Wolves of the Steppes’ after which the quartet braved Deimos’ fortress in ‘Battlecry’ as the unliving savant began experimenting on little Joshua, marrying Atlantean science with sinister sorceriesâ€¦

The epic concluded in Warlord #21 as Morgan was compelled to battle an adult enslaved version of Joshua in ‘Terminator’. When he killed his own son, the Warlord’s heart broke and his love abandoned himâ€¦ but as ever nothing was as it quite seemedâ€¦

Shell-shocked, Morgan lost himself in drink and bloodletting, battling werewolves and worse in ‘The Beast in the Tower’, subterraneans and cannibals in ‘The Children of Ba’al’ and tragically trysting with a love that could not last in ‘Song of Ligia’ before becoming a mercenary in ‘This Sword For Hire’, making a new friend in unscrupulous but flamboyant thief Ashir.

Together they accept ‘The Challenge’ of winning ultimate knowledge and as Deimos begins his next deadly assault Morgan relives all his past lives (which include Lancelot, Jim Bowie and Crazy Horse) whilst experiencing first hand the true story of ‘Atlantis Dying’â€¦

The last issue in this compilation comprises two linked tales. In the first Morgan crushes alien horrors in ‘The Curse of the Cobra Queen’ whilst the long absent Tara, Mariah and Machiste are drawn into a time-warping encounter with the lost masters of ‘Wizard World’ – the opening salvo in another extended epic that you’ll have to wait for the second volume to enjoyâ€¦

The tricky concept of relativistic time and how it does or doesn’t seem to function in this Savage Paradise increasingly grated with many readers but as Grell’s stated goal was to produce a perfect environment for yarn-spinning, not a science project, the picky pedant would be best advised to suck it up or stay away.

For we simple, thrill-seeking fantasy lovers, however, these are pure escapist tales of action and adventure, light on plot and angst but aggressively and enthusiastically jam-packed with fun and wonder. These are timeless tales that will enthral, beguile and enchant. As the man himself constantly says â€œin Skartaris, always expect the unexpectedâ€â€¦

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